What We Did On Our Summer Vacation
by hayseed42
Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told? A slow-building Dasey. *Complete*
1. Down the Rabbit Hole

A/N: So, um, hey. Long-time listener, first-time caller. For LwD fic, anyway. Also, just FYI, I'm pretty busy in the day-to-day, which translates to me being a fairly slow updater. I _will_ say that the third chapter should be up on next Saturday.

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter One: Down the Rabbit Hole

"No," Derek said flatly.

"See, here's the thing, son," George replied in a voice full of false cheer, "I wasn't really giving you a choice."

"Yeah, but I'm exercising my freewill anyway."

Shaking his head, George just sighed. "Come on, Derek. Think of it as one last hurrah with Ed and Marti. In less than three months, you're going to be moving on to bigger and better things. Don't you get that they're going to miss you?"

He quirked an eyebrow. "Edwin's already asked me if he can have my room."

"Well... _Marti_ will miss you, anyway," he said lamely.

"Nice try, Dad," Derek said, rolling his eyes. "But there's nothing you can do to make me spend two whole weeks with those... _McDonalds_."

Before George could reply, a loud shriek echoed through the room.

"What the hell was that?" Derek cried.

He grinned, ignoring the profanity. "I think Nora just broke the news about our little surprise vacation to Casey."

* * *

She pushed herself as far into the window as she could.

As far away from _Derek_ as she could.

Shooting her a sideways look, he smirked at her. "Aw, Casey, I'm hurt. Don't you like me any more?"

"I'm not talking to you," she said with a sniff.

"Despite all evidence to the contrary," he replied, still smirking.

Furiously, she jammed headphones into her ears and pressed _play_.

Derek rolled his eyes. "Fine," he said. "Whatever. Hey, Dad, how much longer 'til we get there?"

"Ten minutes less than the last time you asked," George said irritably. "Shut up before I muzzle you, Derek."

"Yeah, Derek," Edwin echoed, obviously happy and comfortable in his position in the middle seat. "Quit whining."

"It's not _fair_," he moaned. "My legs are longer than anyone else's. Why do _I_ have to be crammed in this tiny seat way back here?" Idly, he gave Lizzie's seat a kick. "Switch with me, Liz."

She turned around and gave him a glare that made Casey proud. "Well, according to your argument, Ed should switch with Casey, too, since her legs are the second longest, and then you're just right back where you started."

Slumping back with a frown, he muttered something under his breath that she couldn't quite hear over her music. It couldn't have been good, though.

Ten blissful minutes passed without Derek opening his mouth once. She even relaxed a little and went so far as to stretch her legs out as far as the cramped seat would let her. Her bare toes brushed against his leg, and he flinched.

"Keep your appendages to yourself, freak," he snarled, jerking away.

"Sorry," she hissed, 'accidentally' doing it again.

His lips tightened, but he didn't rise to the bait. Until about two minutes later, when he turned in his seat, let out a false yawn and promptly plopped his feet into her lap.

"De-rek," she cried.

"I felt a calf muscle tightening up," he said innocently. "Gotta stretch it out, Case."

Wrinkling her nose, she poked at the sole of one of his feet. "When's the last time you washed your socks, you pig?"

With a wide smile, he wiggled his toes. "Is that an _offer_?"

Casey glared at him and shoved his feet off of her. "Stay away from me," she said.

"Kind of hard to do when we're stuck in this lousy car together for the next six hours," he said mildly.

"Keep it up, you two, and you won't have to worry about being stuck back there," George called from the driver's seat.

"You mean you'll finally give in and let me drive?" Derek shot back.

"No, I mean I'll tie you both to the roof along with the luggage," he said, setting both Marti and Lizzie off in a fit of giggles.

"You're bluffing. You totally didn't bring enough rope for that," Derek said in a lofty tone, and Casey bit back a smile in spite of herself.

* * *

The house was... well, smaller than she'd thought. Somehow, when her mom had said they were spending two weeks in an old 'country house,' she'd envisioned something more along the lines of that house from _Gone with the Wind_. But she was resolved to make do -- it was all about _family_, right?

Plus, right after they stopped for lunch, her mom said if she could go the entire two weeks being civil to Derek, she'd consider letting her try and find an off-campus apartment instead of living in a dorm.

So when Derek came up beside her on the front walk and dropped his duffel bag on her foot, she just offered him a bright smile. "What're _you_ so happy about?" he asked rudely. "This place is a dump."

"Yeah," Edwin said, coming back around the corner -- he and Lizzie had shot out of the car and begun exploring before George even had a chance to start untying the luggage. "There's no pool or anything."

"The curtains are closed," Lizzie said as she walked up from the opposite direction, "so I don't know what we're looking at inside. But if the outside is any indication..."

"Oh, come on, kids," her mom interjected brightly, "it'll be an _adventure_."

"As long as it's an adventure with cable TV," Edwin muttered.

With a shrug, Casey remembered her mother's promise and lightly elbowed Derek. "Let's help George with the rest of the stuff from the car."

He gave her a wide-eyed stare. "Are you a pod person or something? I've got all _I_ need," he said, kicking his bag. "Got the keys, Nora?"

She went back to the car anyway and grabbed a couple of bags.

"Thanks, Casey," George said.

"I'm sure Derek'll help out once he's got his stuff situated," she said, amazed at her own ability to lie with a straight face.

George, however, just laughed. "That boy's in for a _huge_ surprise once he goes off to college and doesn't have anyone to pick up after him."

And that was enough to sour her good mood.

He seemed to pick up on it. "You know, Casey," he began thoughtfully, "I seriously doubt Derek even thought about what he was doing. It's got nothing to do with you."

"I really want to believe you, George," she said in a sad voice. "But if that were the case, why did he wait to spring it on me like that?"

It was really hard to take him seriously... well, ever, but particularly when he was loaded down with suitcases and fishing gear. "I'll be honest with you," he said. "If Derek _really_ made such a big decision based solely on you, I'd be very disappointed in him."

She didn't actually have anything to say to that, so she just followed him into the house, where her mom was waiting at the front door.

"George," her mom said, "we have a big problem."

He sighed. "What is it now?"

Just then, Derek came bursting into the foyer. "I can't believe you, Dad!" he cried. "Why would you rent a house that only has three bedrooms?"

"Um..." he said, looking confused. "Because I'm not made of money?"

Casey puzzled it out. "Three bedrooms?" she asked. "So, one for Mom and George, one for you and Edwin, and then Liz, Marti and I take the third. That's not too bad. Can't you share for two weeks, Derek?"

"Oh, you'd like that, wouldn't you?" he retorted. "How about the fact that each bedroom only has two beds? Were you planning on making my poor baby sister sleep on the floor?"

Blinking, she pushed her anger down and gritted her teeth. "Well, no," she said. "But I don't think her father was either when he rented the place."

"The brochure said something about a sleeper sofa in the basement," George said, jumping in before the fight could really get started. "I was thinking maybe..."

"I'll take my stuff down there," Casey said.

"Better idea," Derek interjected, blocking the entrance. "How about you and Liz bunk together, and Marti stays with Ed? I'll sleep downstairs in the dark, scary basement so you don't have to."

She blew out a frustrated sigh. "Fine, Derek. I don't care."

"But why would you be giving up a chance at privacy so easily?" he asked, more to himself than anyone else. "No, I don't like it. Sorry, Case. I call dibs on the bedroom with the attached bath."

_Damn_. But she wasn't going to fight. The dorm rooms on campus were like little matchboxes.

Her mom saw the set of her jaw and obviously decided that an intervention was needed. "Look, you two, we can decide this fairly."

"Sure," George said, fumbling in his pockets and pulling out a coin. "Heads, and Casey sleeps downstairs. Tails, and it's Derek." He flipped it in the air and caught it deftly on the palm of his hand.

"Well?" Derek asked irritably.

* * *

The basement wasn't too bad, Casey decided. And Derek had been right -- it would be nice to have a more or less private space. So she had to go upstairs to use either of the bathrooms; that was okay.

Her privacy lasted all of five minutes. Before she could so much as unzip her suitcase, she heard loud footsteps pounding down the stairs, and Derek came flying into the room, flinging himself on her couch.

"De-rek," she cried, unable to help herself.

"Sorry, Case," he said unapologetically. "But the pool table's down here. You wouldn't want to deprive a growing boy of his pool-playing needs, would you? Now, be a good girl and rack 'em."

Glancing down, she idly noticed that the table she'd put her bag on was, in fact, a pool table. Other than the sofa, it was the only piece of furniture in the room, and unfortunately, it was probably the one piece of furniture in the whole house that Derek was interested in, given her luck.

"I will not," she retorted.

"Gotta get sharp now," he said, picking up a pool cue and hefting it experimentally. "Lots of opportunity to make cash at school this way."

She felt her eyes narrow into slits. "I'm not having this conversation with you, Derek," she said quietly.

He snorted. "Like we ever have _conversation_. Now come on, play a game with me. Ed's lost in figuring out what channels we have, and Marti's too little."

"Play with yourself," she tossed over her shoulder, making her way up the stairs.

"How's the basement, Casey?" her mother asked from the kitchen area.

"Infested with vermin," she said shortly. "But he has to come up for food sometime. Speaking of, what can I help you with, Mom?"

"Washing dishes," she replied. "I'm not going to eat off anything we haven't washed ourselves."

"Sure." Casey flipped on the tap and began filling the sink.

Her mom came to stand beside her, holding a dishtowel Casey recognized from home. "Casey, I know this isn't your ideal way to spend your summer vacation, but thanks for playing along."

"Well, it _is_ the last time I'm really going to get to spend any time with Lizzie and Marti," she said, handing her a freshly washed plate. "And it won't be so bad. It's really pretty outside, and I bet there's a lake or something nearby."

The back door slammed and Marti came scooting into the kitchen. "There's a secret garden!" she shrieked. "Just like in my book. I'm gonna have a tea party in there." She careened around the corner without waiting for a response.

Casey exchanged a bemused look with her mother. "Sounds like Marti's going to have a blast here," she said.

"Marti can have fun pretty much anywhere," her mom replied. "It's one of her cuter qualities."

"I'll have to add her 'secret garden' to my list of stuff to check out."

"There's a horse farm not too far away. That's one of the reasons George and I picked this _particular_ house," her mom said. After a short pause, she grinned. "Well, that and the fact that it belongs to one of my clients, so they let it to us for half the going rate. You wouldn't believe how expensive summer rentals are."

"I might," she said evasively. She and Emily had briefly checked out how much it would cost to rent a beach house for this summer, to get out of their houses before Casey in particular had to resort to homicide. The sticker shock was enough to change their minds, though.

"We're planning on using what we saved on the house to finance the activities," she explained. "There's horseback riding, there's a community pool in the next town, and we were thinking of driving into New York City at some point to catch a show."

She fought back her rising excitement. "We're _that_ close to New York?" she asked, frowning at her own enthusiasm.

Her mother smiled at her antics. "Well, no. It's still a good four or five hours from us. But you and I are intrepid enough to make that trip, aren't we?"

"Maybe Lizzie, too, if she wants to go," she said. "But doesn't George like--"

"George mostly likes Derek not setting the house on fire in his absence," she said with an ironic laugh. "He and I can make trips like that more often on our own, now that..."

Casey couldn't help it -- she winced.

"Oh, Case," her mother said, sitting the pot she was drying on the counter and giving her a little sideways squeeze. "I didn't mean it like that. But you have to admit, it'll be easier when..."

"Derek and I don't mess everything up for everyone else," she completed dryly.

Her mother didn't say anything, which pretty much proved her point.

Tossing a handful of silverware into the dishwater, she began scrubbing at a bit of rust on a knife. "We don't mean to," she said. "Well, _I_ don't. Derek does, probably."

"Honey, you're mad at him right now," she said gently, taking the knife out of her hand and putting it to the side. "Your opinion doesn't really count."

"Then it never should, because I'm _always_ mad at him," Casey said with a bitter laugh.

"You've been particularly... vitriolic lately."

She felt tears stinging her eyes as she stared down at the sink. The tines of a fork jabbed into her hand under the water. "Mom, can we not talk about this right now?"

A comforting hand rested on her shoulder. "Of course, Casey. I don't mean to push." After a few seconds, the hand withdrew and her mother's voice took on a decidedly brighter tone. "Now, this is your summer _vacation_, for goodness sakes. Why don't you go and enjoy it? I'll draft George to help me finish up the dishes."

Tilting her head, she wrinkled her nose at her mother. "Mom, I don't mind--"

She gave Casey's hip an affectionate bump with her own. "Yeah, you do. You're just too nice to say anything about it. Why don't you go and see if you aren't invited to Marti's tea party?"

Shaking her head, Casey rinsed off her hands and went out the back door, wondering where the hell she ought to go looking for a 'secret garden' in upstate New York.

* * *

It didn't turn out to be that hard to find, actually. Well, it might've, except that she saw Marti hightailing it across the backyard, carrying a bag almost as big as herself, and decided to follow her, rather than wasting time.

The backyard sloped downward -- Marti sent herself hurtling down so fast Casey was sure she was going to fall and break her neck -- ending in a little stream, which Marti ran through without so much as a pause. Casey _did_ pause, though, wondering whether or not she ought to take off her shoes. In the end, she decided that the risk of cutting a foot on a rock was just too high and waded in, gasping as her sneakers flooded with icy-cold water.

"Jeez," she grumbled to herself. "It's freaking _July_."

"Yeah, but we're also in the freaking _mountains_," an irritatingly familiar voice said from somewhere over her left shoulder.

"What are you doing here, Derek?" she asked without even turning around.

An arm dropped heavily across her shoulders and water sloshed around her bare legs as Derek waded in after her. "Am I not allowed to follow Marti too? I _am_ her big brother, after all."

She shoved him roughly. "Go away."

"Last time I heard anything about it, this was a free country," he retorted, returning her shove so hard she stumbled in the water. With a smirk, he pushed past her and started walking across the wide field of grass on the other side of the stream.

"De-rek!" she heard herself shout, scrambling to follow.

Her sneakers squelched as she ran, and as she approached, Derek broke into a trot, staying about ten paces ahead of her until they finally caught up to Marti.

"He-ey!" Derek shouted, sweeping the little girl up in his arms. "Where's my little Smarti running off to?"

"Derek, put me down," she shrieked somewhere in the middle of all the giggling.

Unimpressed, Casey just folded her arms across her chest and glared at him.

Shaking his head, he put Marti back on the ground and picked up her bag instead. "Would Madame mind if I carried her oh-so-heavy bag for her?"

"Be careful," Marti said, still smiling. "It's got stuff that'll break in it."

"Like what?" Derek asked curiously, hand moving to the zipper.

Immediately, a little hand slapped at his arm. "No!" she said. "You're not allowed."

He quirked an eyebrow at her. "Really? What, is it some 'girls only' thing? Can _Casey_ look?"

Peeking around Derek, Marti appeared to notice Casey standing there for the first time. "Oh, hi, Casey. Yeah, _she_ can look in my bag, but not because she's a girl. It's because she's _nice_."

Casey couldn't help giving Derek a smug smile.

"And she's invited to play with me, if she wants."

Derek's expression was wounded. "What have I done to _you_, kiddo? All I want to do is spend some quality time with my little sis, and here she is, ditching me for Spacey the Study Freak."

"See?" Marti shot back, stamping her foot. "That's _mean_, Derek. If you can't be nice to Casey, I won't show you my secret."

Again with the eyebrow. "Secret?" he echoed. "You know you're not allowed to keep secrets from your big brother."

"I'm not?" she asked, a little bit of fear showing on her face.

"Keeping secrets leads to very dangerous consequences..." he drawled.

Casey rolled her eyes but somehow managed to keep quiet.

"Oh, yeah?" Marti retorted, some sass leaking back into her voice. "Like _what_?"

"Like unleashing the tickle monster!" Derek cried with a growling noise. He stretched out his hands and pretended to charge her.

Giggling wildly, Marti took off running again, starting to shriek as Derek gave chase. Picking up the discarded bag of toys with a little headshake, Casey followed them at a slower pace.

She stopped short, though, when she saw the hedge.

More correctly, she ran into Derek's back because she was too busy staring to see where she was going. "Holy..." she murmured.

"That's... random," he said quietly.

Beyond the brook and across the field, a ten-foot tall hedge grew in the middle of nowhere. It appeared to be well tended, but there was no indication of anybody living anywhere close by. Their house had long since disappeared out of view, and a huge wall of plants was the sort of thing Casey had always envisioned being a part of a great estate, or a palace or something.

"Marti," she began slowly, "is _this_ your secret garden?"

Marti rolled her eyes. "Of course not," she said. "The garden is through the door."

"Door?" Casey and Derek echoed in unison, shooting each other twin glares.

"Sure." Reaching out, she grabbed their hands and dragged them around the corner.

"That's... even more random," Derek said weakly.

A wooden door was set into the hedge about halfway down. Casey immediately walked over to it and gave it a little push. "Where are the hinges?" she wondered aloud.

"I think you're missing the bigger question here, Case," he said, stepping around her to give the door an experimental prod himself. "Why the hell would someone build a garden in the middle of nowhere and then go to the trouble of putting in an unlocked _door_?"

"I don't like it," she said with a frown. "It's creepy, and we're probably trespassing. Come on, Marti, let's go back to the house."

"Aww..." she said, only whining a little. "I wanted to play tea party. And there's a swing, too."

"No," Casey said decisively. "Marti, it's probably not safe."

Derek rolled his eyes at her. "Don't boss her around like that. If she wants to play here, it's none of your business, McDonald."

She just arched an eyebrow. "Because if she gets killed, Mom and George won't blame the people looking after her _at all_, is that it, _Venturi_?"

"She's _my_ sister," he spat, jabbing his finger into her chest. "So back off. And I resent the implication that I don't care about her well-being."

"You don't care about anyone but yourself!" she said angrily.

So the apartment was officially out of the question, then. Equally disheartening was the realization that she and Derek couldn't go more than three hours without fighting, despite her best efforts. Well... okay, despite her _so-so_ efforts, then.

His eyes narrowed. "I--"

But she'd held it in for too long. "If you _cared_, you wouldn't boss Edwin and Marti around like they were your little minions. And you sure as hell wouldn't have gone to all the trouble to get into the same university as me. Don't you realize that I've spent the last three years trying to get _away_ from you?"

"Casey, don't you--"

She cut him off again. "And how did you even get _accepted_? I finished top of our class, and you were lucky to even finish at all. I can't believe you, Derek. You can't even let me have this one little thing all to myself!"

At the end of her rope, Casey put her hands on Derek's chest and just _pushed_ with all of her might.

As he went pinwheeling backward, he lunged out and grabbed at her wrist. Flailing, she lost her balance and crashed into him. Together, they fell back onto the door into Marti's garden.

The door swung open, Marti screamed, and Casey felt herself falling into darkness.

* * *


	2. What Casey and Derek Found

A/N: I'm going ahead and posting the first two chapters to give a better sense of the actual plot. Otherwise, posting is going to be quite slow (weekly at the very maximum). Also, just in case it's a question: yes, this is a Dasey-type story, but it's a slow builder.

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Two: And What Casey and Derek Found

Derek hit the ground with a thud, all the air whooshing out of his body as Casey landed on top of him.

"Damn it, Casey!" he cried, flipping her off him and giving her an elbow to the ribs for good measure.

"Wh... what just happened?" she asked, sounding kind of dazed. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her pick herself up and start brushing dust off her clothes.

He scratched at his head, wincing as he found a lump at the base of his skull. "We fell for a long time," he said.

"And I heard... oh, no!"

"What?" he asked, quickly standing up. "Is it Marti? Is she hurt?"

She was pale. "The door. It's closed."

With a sigh, he started cleaning the dirt from his clothes, mentally cursing as he saw a fresh tear in his shorts. "So, uh, open it?"

"No, Derek," she said in the same voice he'd heard her use on three-year-olds before. "There's no knob, no lock, no way to get it open."

He just rolled his eyes and sauntered up to the thing. "Okay, so we'll knock and Marti will open it from the other side." Raising a fist, he banged on the door three times. "Hey, Smarti, we're sorry we were fighting, okay? Just let us out."

Nothing. Not even so much as a giggle.

"Marti?" he shouted at the door. "This isn't funny. What if Casey and I killed each other over here? You'd feel really bad, wouldn't you?"

"Um... Derek..." Casey said faintly.

Ignoring her, he knocked again. "No, Case, I really think I'm reaching her. _Marti_!" he bellowed.

She tugged at his shirttail. "No, Derek, you _really_ need to turn around right now."

With a huff, he spun around and glared at her. "_What_?"

Wordlessly, she just put her hand on his chin and tilted it upward, so that he was looking at the sky.

Specifically, so that he was looking at the sun.

And the other sun.

Without knowing exactly how, Derek went from standing to sitting. "Casey, there are two suns."

"I know," she said, giving him a wide-eyed, fearful look.

"No, I don't think you do," he replied. "Because if you did, you'd be freaking out like I am. _Two suns_!"

She dropped to her knees and leaned forward. "Don't you think I'm _freaking out_?" she hissed, her face completely drained of color. "Derek, where the _fuck_ are we?"

And the sound of _that_ word tumbling off Casey McDonald's lips stunned Derek almost as much as the realization that there was no way they could still be on the planet Earth, much less still in New York.

* * *

"Well, Toto..." he drawled.

"You say it, and I'll hurt you," Casey warned.

"What?" he asked, keeping his voice as innocent as he could. "I was just going to suggest that we look around to see if we can find a key or something."

She glared at him. "First of all, that's so not what you were going to say. And second of all, how's a key going to help, genius? There's no _lock_."

Exasperated, he matched her glare for glare. "Well, what do you recommend, then?"

"We need to find someone who can help us," she said, turning to stare at the treeline. "There's bound to be, like, a town or something somewhere."

Derek shook his head so hard he felt his hair flying around his ears. "No way," he said firmly. "Sooner or later, that door's going to open, and I'm going to be right here when it does."

With a deprecating laugh, she just smirked at him. "Like that would help. Derek, don't you get it? Something really weird is going on, and we don't know _what_ would happen if that door opened up again. We'd be better off finding someone who knows where we are."

He crossed his legs, folded his hands in his lap, and gave her a patient look. "Go right ahead, Casey. You go tripping off into dangers untold all you want. I'm staying put."

In response, she turned and gazed skyward. "The suns are setting," she said quietly. "It's going to be dark soon. Do you really want to spend the night out here?"

The goose bumps that suddenly appeared on his arms and legs were involuntary and probably had _nothing_ to do with what she'd just said. "I'm not afraid of the dark," he said with bravado he told himself wasn't false.

"How about wild animals that like to hunt in the dark?" she asked dryly. "What's your opinion on _those_?"

"Casey, Casey, Casey," he said, shaking his head and smiling. "If you haven't figured it out after all this time, you shouldn't bullshit a bullshit artist. There's just no point."

She shrugged and started walking away. "It's your choice, Derek. Give my regards to the lions, tigers, and bears."

"Oh, my," he called out to her retreating back, chuckling when she shot him the bird over her shoulder.

He amused himself by wondering which sun would set first, trying to figure it out without actually staring at them for too long. He _definitely_ wasn't watching Casey get further and further away.

"She'll come back," he muttered to himself. "She'll see I'm right, she'll come back, and then..."

Something rustled in a nearby bush, and before he could help it, he leaped to his feet and sprinted toward the trees.

"Did you want something, Derek?" Casey asked smugly as soon as he caught up to her.

"I can't let a _girl_ go wandering off on her own," he said with a breezy wave. "It's my duty to protect you."

"From _what_?" she asked, giving him an incredulous look.

He winked. "Did you or did you not say something about bears? I happen to be a master bear-slayer."

"Oh, really? Well, what about the lions and tigers?"

"You're on your own there, Case," he said with a shrug.

* * *

The sunset was spectacular. The suns actually slipped below the horizon at the same time, the sky a dazzling array of color. Before they ducked into the forest, Casey made him sit down on the ground and watch it with her. He spent a lot of time watching her expression instead, wondering how they were going to get out of this mess.

Not to mention the fact that since they'd waited to watch the sunset, it was now pretty much dark. Spending the night in a creepy forest hadn't been on Derek's To-Do List for today, but he didn't seem to have a choice in the matter at this point.

As Casey swatted yet another branch out of her face with a muffled curse, Derek couldn't help laughing at her. "So, my door plan is looking better and better, isn't it?"

"Shut up, Derek," she said.

"You're only mad because I'm _right_," he said smugly.

Stopping mid-step, she turned around and wrinkled her nose at him. "You don't want to hear the list of reasons I'm mad at you right now," she retorted.

"You're right," he said. "I don't. Mostly because they're probably all stupid. Or about my personal hygiene, which is none of your damn business, anyway."

"When I have to _live_ with it, it's my business," she said tightly, resuming picking her way through the trees.

He bit back a cry of pain as a bramble lashed across his calf. "Content yourself with the fact that you won't have to live with it much longer. College in the fall, right?"

"Unless you try to get into the same dorm, too. If you're going to ruin my life, you might as well make a complete mess of it, right, Derek?"

_This_ was a problem he wanted to address. If only because avoiding it now would mean spending the next four years hearing Casey bitch about it every time they went back home. "I know this might be a foreign concept, but the world doesn't go around _you_, Casey."

She sniffed but stayed silent. Was it possible she was listening to him?

"I didn't pick your school because it was _your_ school, you dummy," he said evenly. "It was the only school that didn't accept me on conditional."

"Huh?" That sounded like genuine confusion, and something in the vicinity of his heart twitched.

"The other schools that offered me hockey scholarships had stipulations that I had to retake a bunch of classes and basically enter the school on academic probation from day one," he explained. "But one of them said I could come in with a clean slate. I can see that you wouldn't get how that's an appealing thing for a guy like me, but..."

"Derek," she said slowly, snapping off a branch and tossing it to the side, "I didn't know that."

He shrugged. "Yeah, well, it's not like I posted it on my blog or anything."

"I guess..." Her next words were careful, as if she were calculating exactly how much they were going to cost her even as she spoke them. "I'm sorry, Derek."

He grinned, but it was way too dark for her to see it. "If it's any consolation, I'm going to do better in university," he said. "And you won't even know I'm there -- it's a big campus, Casey."

"It is that," she said, sounding happier than she had for a month or more. "And we won't be taking any of the same classes."

"God forbid," he said, meaning it.

For a few moments, the only sound was that of their feet shuffling through the leaves. And then...

"That's if we ever get back," she said.

"We'll get back," he said confidently.

Her shoulders hunched. "But what if--"

On impulse, not really knowing why, he leaned forward and wrapped his hand around her wrist. "Look, Case," he said, all but forcing her to stop walking, "I'll get you home. All you have to do is trust me."

Wide-eyed, her lips twitched a little. "I can't believe you just said that."

He smiled at her and realized it was one of the first times he'd ever given her a genuine smile. "I sounded like a cheesy action hero just then, didn't I?"

"You're only missing the spandex and some weird superpower," she teased.

"Hey, Captain Venturi doesn't _do_ spandex," he said.

With a shake of her head, she tapped at his arm with her free hand. "Much to the joy of all," she said, deadpan. "Although, if fair's fair, maybe I'll be the one to get you home."

"You just want to steal my superpowers, don't you?" he asked with a mock-pout.

"Because super-annoyance is just such an awesome ability, _Captain Venturi_," she said, returning his pout with what he was pretty sure was an equally mock sneer.

It finally occurred to him that he was still holding her wrist, so he let her go. "You forgot super-charm and super-slap-shot."

She laughed, and he realized that he'd accomplished his goal -- cheering her up. If only he'd known that was actually his purpose. "No," she said, grinning widely, "I didn't."

* * *

"I'm hungry," he said, breaking the more-or-less companionable silence.

"Oh, well, let me just check the picnic basket and see what we've got," Casey said sarcastically.

He lifted a particularly large branch blocking their path and tossed it to the side. "I'm just saying. Aren't you?"

"Maybe I was trying not to think about it," she said with a clenched jaw.

"We're in a forest. Doesn't it have, like, berries and stuff?" he asked.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see her waving her arms around. "Are you _insane_? We're in the middle of a weird forest in a place that has two freaking suns, and you want to sample the local flora in the middle of the night when we can't even _see_ what we're eating?"

With a shrug, he pulled at a vine, wincing as thorns pricked his fingers. "It sounds worse when _you_ say it."

"After it's light again, if we see something that doesn't look poisonous, I'll consider it," she said. "That's _if_! You, of course, are free to stuff whatever you want in your mouth and drop dead at any time."

"How does something _look_ poisonous, Casey? Besides, how would you know anyway?" He was proud of himself for only sounding a _bit_ resentful. Idly, he swatted at a firefly attempting to dive bomb his nose.

Before he could catch it, though, her hands darted out and cupped around the thing. "Derek, don't hurt it!" she cried. "Fireflies are harmless."

"And annoying," he said off-handedly. "I can see why you'd feel a connection."

He could see the eerie glow seeping out around her fingers and lighting up her face. Slowly, she uncurled her hands. "Hey..." she said in a soft voice. "It's not a firefly."

"What is it?" he asked, raising his eyebrows. "And is it edible?"

"I... I think it's a fairy," she whispered.

With a snort, he leaned over her hands. "Case, there's no way..." Trailing off, Derek just stared. A tiny person-shaped thing with wings was curled up in her palm. "Shit," he said wonderingly.

"It's so cute," she exclaimed, still in that raspy whisper. "I wonder if we could use -- _ow_!" With a loud shriek, she started shaking her hand around in the air, flinging the creature away.

"What the hell, Casey?" he said angrily, ducking the buzzing thing as it attempted to dive-bomb him again.

"It _bit_ me!" she retorted, holding up her hand and showing him two droplets of blood on her index finger.

Rolling his eyes, he gave the fairy one last swat, knocking her out of his line of sight. "Well, what do you expect? It probably got mad when you caught it."

"I thought fairies did nice things," she muttered.

"Yeah, you and that chick from that puppet movie," he said with a grin. At her baffled expression, he just shrugged. "Marti has, like, every Jim Henson movie ever made, and I think she's made me sit through each of them ten times. I kind of like the one with the biting fairy -- the girl who's in it is hot."

She gave her hand a little shake. "It stings. Oh, and _ew_."

"Think of it like an enchanted bee sting," he retorted, unconcerned. "And unless you want to stand here for the rest of the night staring at it, we need to get moving again."

"Yeah," she said faintly. "It just... that was weird."

"So's everything else about today," he said, nudging her gently with his elbow. "Come on, Casey. If you can suck it up and be a big girl, I'll buy you an ice cream when we get home."

Her answering poke was anything but gentle. "You're an idiot."

* * *

Some time after the suns rose, Derek found a patch of fruit that looked close enough to strawberries that he pointed them out to Casey.

"They're growing on trees, though," she said in a flat voice. "Real strawberries grow on the ground."

"And real fairies don't bite," he said sarcastically, plucking a berry from the tree. "Do you mind?"

Flapping a hand in the air, she put a neutral expression on her face. "By all means."

Carefully, he bit off the tip and chewed at it thoughtfully. "It sure _tastes_ like a strawberry," he said.

"How do you _feel_?" she asked with wide eyes.

Swirling the last of it in his mouth, he took another bite. "Fine," he told her. "I'm breathing okay, my stomach is fine, and nothing's going numb. Anything else I should be looking out for, you think?"

"Oh, thank _God_," she said, groaning more than just a little as she picked a few of the berries and stuffed them in her mouth. "I've never been so hungry in all my life!"

Not too far from the strawberry trees, they found a clear-running brook. Casey dipped a couple of fingers in the water and pronounced it drinkable, cupping her hands and bringing a mouthful to her lips.

Derek didn't care, though, and he just lowered himself to his belly and shoved his face in the water, drinking deeply. When he pulled his head back up, he saw that she was frowning at him. "What?" he asked defensively.

"I just... never mind," she said. "It's not worth it."

"I'm thirsty," he said. "I'm not going to pretend I'm not. And it's stupid for you to. Just drink, Case."

She shook her head. "Leaning over makes me dizzy."

Rolling onto his side, he shot her a concerned look. "You still hungry?"

"I think it's from last night," she said. "My hand _really_ hurts."

Without thinking, he reached out and grabbed the hand in question, noting how she flinched at his touch. "Let me see it."

What looked like a pinprick last night was far worse this morning. Her whole hand had a faintly pink tinge, and the bite itself was badly swollen. "You're hurting me," she said unnecessarily.

"Damn, Casey," he said, using his other hand to scoop up some of the cold water in an effort to wash out her wound. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"It didn't hurt this bad last night," she replied. "It's really only gotten worse in the last..."

Abruptly, her head lolled on her shoulders and her eyes rolled back, showing a sickening flash of white before they slid shut. "Casey?" Derek asked, sitting up and catching her before she could fall to the ground. "_Casey_!"

Nothing.

* * *

He didn't know how much time had passed. Every now and again, he stopped to make sure she was still breathing, but that was about the best he could do.

Following the stream was the only idea he could come up with. He figured anyone living around here would probably live close to the water, so that was his best chance of running into someone. Plus, when they stopped, he was able to splash some more water on her hand. It was the closest he was going to get to being able to keep it clean.

Otherwise, he just slung her over his shoulder like his hockey bag and kept walking. Just in case she could hear him, he kept up a running commentary. Nothing but random babble, really, but he watched enough television to know that coma patients could still hear everything that went on around them.

"You're really a stupid _girl_ sometimes, you know, Casey? I mean, why the hell would you think it would be a good idea to try and catch a fairy? I know girls think stuff like that is pretty or whatever, but I mean _honestly_. We're in the middle of fuck-knows-where, and you decide that now is a good time to act like Marti?"

Another water break. He tried to cup some water in his hand and tip it down her throat but ended up splashing most of it on her shirt. She didn't so much as twitch.

"I still can't believe this. Stuff like this just doesn't happen, or does it? It sounds more like one of your stupid stories. Which I've never read, but maybe I heard Lizzie talking about one of them some time. I always wondered why you write things like that -- I mean, it's not like you're going to be a writer or anything, Miss Med School or whatever. You could be if you wanted to, though. I'm only saying this because I don't think you'll remember it at all, but you could probably do whatever you wanted to, Casey. Including not dying. Not dying would be a good thing for you to focus your efforts on at the moment."

He hadn't really gone far enough to stop, but it was getting harder to carry her. He propped her up against a tree for a minute, trying to get his breathing under control.

"What would I tell Nora if you died out here? So there's nothing for it, Case. You're just going to have to suck it up and not die. We've got to go to school together and everything. I know I promised I wouldn't bug you, but we'll probably have to drive up together and all that. Hey, how about this? If you don't die, I'll let you pick all of the music for the whole trip. I'll even listen to... _show tunes_. But if you die, the deal's off."

By this point, he was gasping for air, his knees screaming under the weight of two people. He was in pretty good shape, and Casey wasn't a particularly heavy burden, but he wasn't up to lugging much more than a backpack through the wilderness like this -- not a full-grown girl.

"I tell you, Casey, if we're going to keep this up, you're going to have to go on a diet. No offense. It's not like you need to lose weight or anything if you're just going to be a normal, obnoxious girl. But if you're going to be Coma Victim Casey, I can't just keep carrying you around like this unless you're, like, skeletal."

Nothing. Not even a sigh.

So he did it for her. "De-rek!" he squeaked in an imitation of her voice to himself quietly, sadly.

* * *

He was saved from permanent knee damage by the appearance of a small thatched cottage over the next hill. As he approached, a shriveled old man stuck his head out of the door. "Who are you?" he asked suspiciously.

"Please," Derek panted. "She needs help. She's sick." As carefully as he could, he unslung Casey from his shoulder and laid her on the ground.

"What manner of clothing are you wearing, boy?"

Like _he_ had room to talk. He was wearing something that looked more like a moldy old bathrobe than anything else. "Does it matter?" he asked stupidly. "She's gonna _die_!"

The man shuffled out of the house and leaned over them with a disdainful sniff. "You idiot," he said. "Don't you know when a girl's been fairy-bitten?"

"I know she was bitten," he said, voice grating with irritation. "I was there, dude."

"Then why have you not cured her?"

His hands clenched into fists. "I don't know _how_!"

The old man nudged Casey with a foot wrapped in smelly... something. Maybe ten lifetimes ago, it had been a shoe. "Perhaps you just don't like kissing girls?"

"Kissing?" he squeaked. "What does kissing have to do with anything?"

Rolling his eyes, the man folded his arms across his chest and glared. "To break the sleep spell, the girl needs a kiss. What do they teach you children in school these days?"

"Like... algebra and stuff," he said. And then it clicked. "Wait... you mean I have to kiss _Casey_. That's... that's..."

The man cocked an eyebrow.

"That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my entire life!" he shouted. "Why the hell would a kiss cure a bug bite?"

"Damn it, boy," the man said, "why would you think _I_ know? No one knows why the magic works. We just know it does."

He was so caught up in staring at Casey, he almost didn't hear that last bit. "Wait... magic?"

The man huffed. "Are you going to kiss her, you little fool, or do I have to step in?"

"N-no," Derek stammered. "I can do it."

He figured Casey would be less mad if he kissed her instead of letting a filthy old man have the honor.

Taking a big breath, he leaned toward her. "I'm really, really sorry about this," he said, not sure just who he was apologizing to.

Her lips were soft, warm, and completely unresponsive. It was possibly the least romantic kiss in the history of kissing. After a couple of seconds, he realized nothing was going to happen.

As Derek drew away, he scowled up at the old man. "Well, that was a total wash."

Whatever the man was going to say was cut off as someone started coughing.

As _Casey_ started coughing.

Her eyes fluttered open and she gave him a baffled look. "Derek, I don't..."

Hiccupping, she threw up all over his shirt.

And he was so glad she was awake that he totally forgot to be furious with her.

* * *


	3. Was a Weird, Smelly Guy

A/N: The rating on this story is quite conservative, just to let you know. Mostly, I tacked on the M because I tend to use a fair amount of language, and _technically_, that gets a higher rating. Also, this story is intended to be satire, so expect everything from here on out to be quite tongue-in-cheek. Thanks for reading!

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Three: Was a Weird, Smelly Guy

Casey spent a long time living in a dream world filled with hazy colors and gentle voices. The voices mostly sounded like Derek, which was why she was pretty sure she was dreaming.

The first time she _really_ woke up, there was a hand under her head and a cloth scrubbing uncomfortably at her face. "You said she'd get better," she heard Derek say, almost in her ear.

"If you had administered the cure immediately, she would not be in this condition," another voice said irritably.

"Oh, sure, blame _me_," he retorted, continuing to wash her face.

Wait... wash her face?

"Because it's common knowledge that when a freaking fairy bites you, you've got to make out with the nearest warm body," he said sarcastically. "Has anyone ever told you that you're a crazy old man?"

That conjured up a fuzzy recollection of his face hovering over hers in a horrible caricature of a kiss. Her eyes flew open. "Wha...?" she croaked. Damn but her throat was dry.

He dropped the cloth and yanked his hand out from under her so quickly that her head slammed back against the headboard.

"De-rek," she said, voice still rasping.

"You're awake," he replied unnecessarily. "Wh... are you okay?"

"Water?" she asked hopefully.

The other voice answered her, sounding much closer this time. "Sit up, child."

It was a struggle, but she managed it, propping herself up and ignoring how much her shoulders protested at the movement. "How long?" she asked, accepting the cup of water pushed into her hands.

"You have slept since your arrival more than four days ago," the man said. He was probably the oldest person she'd ever seen in her entire life, judging by the lines on his face, but he moved like a much younger man. "The idiot boy and I have had much to discuss."

"Not really," Derek told her, glowering at him from across the bed. "Mostly he just insults me for letting you get hurt, which was totally your own fault by the way."

She sipped at her water. "Sounds fun."

The man cleared his throat.

With a glare, Derek shook his head. "Oh, excuse _me_," he said loudly. "I meant that he insults me for not instantly knowing how to fix you and taking immediate action. I keep telling him we're from a fairy-free zone, but then he starts asking just when I sustained a head injury." Leaning down, he smirked. "I think he thinks I'm a dangerous influence on you, Case," he whispered.

Laughing was painful. "But we are," she told the man once she'd regained her breath.

"What?" he asked, raising an eyebrow and taking the empty cup out of her hands.

"Not from around here," she elaborated. "And we're trying to find our way back home."

He looked back and forth between the two of them a couple of times. "Just where did you children come from?"

Scowling, Derek snatched up the damp cloth and went back to wiping off her forehead. "Sure, when I try to tell you about television and the space shuttle, you think I'm stupid. But all Casey has to do is wake up from her coma and say cryptic stuff about looking for _home_, and you're all love and kisses."

One word stood out to her. "Coma?" she asked quietly. "Really? And, Derek, I'm not _two_. I don't need you to wash my face."

"Well, I'm not a doctor, but five days is a hell of a long time to take a nap," he said, something like concern in his eyes. Which she was probably just imagining, but anyway. "And between you and me, Casey, you smell kind of bad. Almost week without a bath, remember? Besides, you've been running a fever, and the old dude said it would be bad for fairy sweat to dry on your skin or something. You slept through the rest of your sponge bath, though."

"De-rek!" she wheezed, feeling the heat of a blush.

He grinned. "Relax, Case. I kept it PG-13. Although I have to say, orange? Not really what I'd've picked out for you, but I guess it's your choice."

"As soon as I can stand up without falling over," she said, "I'm going to kill you."

"While your antics are quite amusing," the man interjected, interrupting their glaring contest, "you still have not answered my question."

"What question?" Derek asked, not taking his eyes off her.

He sounded exasperated. "Where are you _from_?"

"There was a door," Casey said, remembering Marti's secret garden as if from a dream. Derek's frown deepened and she stuck her tongue out at him.

The man erupted in a splutter of coughs, causing both of them to finally turn. "A... _door_?" he echoed, wide-eyed. "You two come from behind the door? Tell me, is everyone over there as foolish as you?"

"Pretty much," Derek said with a shrug.

She almost picked another argument with him over that little comment -- _almost_. But she was more interested in what the old man knew about the door, so she kept quiet.

"How did you open it?" the man asked, obviously incredulous.

"Are you going to call me stupid again if I tell you?" he shot back.

Lips curling over his teeth in a sneer, the man sighed. "Only if you deserve it."

He rolled his eyes. "Fine. Okay, so when my kid sister was outside playing, she found a garden behind a weird door. So Casey and I went to make sure she wasn't, like, playing in toxic waste or something. And we got in a fight, like always, and knocked each other into the door. It opened, we fell in and wound up here. In hell. "

Tilting her head downward, Casey permitted herself a smile. While technically correct, his explanation was so utterly... _Derek_ that it was almost refreshing. In the middle of all this strangeness, at least he was still himself.

"You don't know how you opened the doorway?"

"No clue, daddy-o," he said, nodding in agreement.

Abruptly, the man hurled the cup at Derek's head -- Derek, of course, ducked it. Damn him. "It requires meditation and skill to open the door. It takes years to accomplish such a feat! And you expect me to believe that you and this... girl-child opened it by _falling_ against it? Either you two are the most powerful mages in the whole of existence, or you're the most idiotic children I've ever met."

"Hey, welcome to the party, Casey," Derek said with a grin, "now you're stupid _too_!"

She was torn between righteous fury and abject despondence. In the end, she went with the fury mostly because she thought it would be more productive. "You don't know anything about us," she said sharply. "You don't know anything about our world. It's not our fault that the door works differently on our side. So stop insulting us and start telling us how to get _home_!" She was horrified to realize that she felt a suspicious tingling in her eyes. Damn it, she wasn't going to cry. Wasn't, wasn't, wasn't.

Expression softening slightly -- but only slightly -- the man leaned over her bed. Casey realized then that he smelled _awful_. "I don't know how to send you home," he said. "Opening the door is beyond my ability. I'm just a keeper."

"But you said people know how to open it, right?" Derek asked. "Let's just find one of them."

"The door has not been opened for many generations," he told them. "I doubt many people even know of its existence."

"So we're..." Casey began, trailing off in horror.

"No," Derek said, giving his head a violent shake. "No, we're not stuck, Casey. There's _always_ a way out. Derek Venturi does not get stuck on the wrong side of bizarre doors!"

She was crying now. Openly and loudly. "Well," she said with a little hiccup. "There's a first time for everything."

"Aw..." he moaned. "Don't cry, Case."

"Indeed." If possible, the old man looked _more_ uncomfortable with her tears than even Derek. "I'm not completely without resource. After all, I am the keeper."

"So, what, like old books of lore or something?" Derek asked sarcastically.

She couldn't help it; she giggled. It only intensified when he tipped her a wink. Was it actually possible he was trying to cheer her up?

Well, if he was, he was doing a pretty crappy job. From where she sat, their situation still basically sucked. But points for effort, maybe.

"Or something," he said. "I will let you know when I find something of interest to you. For now, I leave your friend in your charge."

He grinned at her. "You hear that, Casey? _I'm_ in charge until the weird old dude figures out how to get us back through the magic door."

"Oh, God," she said, laying a hand dramatically over her chest. "We're doomed."

* * *

Not even an hour later, she was so ready to get out of bed that she wanted to scream.

And Derek was absolutely _no_ help whatsoever. Some time in the last five days, his view of her had apparently shifted from 'mortal enemy' to 'helpless infant.' Right after the old man left, he'd tried to spoon-feed her something gross from a bowl. He even made little airplane noises.

Much to her secret satisfaction, the spoon wound up on the other side of the room, and the bowl of what later turned out to be something approaching soup _would_ have been poured out over his head except that she was so damn hungry. And honestly, who needed a spoon to eat soup, anyway? She could sip it just as well.

If her wrists ached from the effort to hold the bowl as she drank, she wasn't about to mention it.

"So..." he drawled.

"What happened?" she asked, putting the bowl to the side. "It sounded like that guy knew something about that thing that bit me."

Derek snorted. "Oh, my _God_, he wouldn't shut up about it for, like, the whole time you were out. And he absolutely refused to believe I didn't know anything about it."

"Are you just going to leave me in the dark or what?"

"Well, you asked for it," he said with a showy sigh. "Apparently, Casey, fairies are poisonous. Did you know that?"

Her lips twitched. "I'd guessed."

"And if someone gets fairy-bitten and they don't treat it, did you know that they fall into an enchanted sleep? 'Cause I thought you were basically worm food as soon as you passed out, but he kept telling me you were asleep and I was a moron."

"_Enchanted_ sleep?" she echoed, eyes widening.

"Yeah, see, this isn't just your run-of-the-mill Fairyland, Case. Welcome to _magical_ Fairyland. My personal theory is that as soon as you're well enough, that old guy is going to try to shove us in the oven and bake us," he said sarcastically.

Something in the back of her mind twitched. "Wait... how did you wake me up out of an _enchanted sleep_, Derek?" she asked slowly. "Because I remember reading a _lot_ of fairy tales as a kid, and the only thing that comes to mind is..."

"Yep," he said, grinning. "You got your first taste of the D-man. Too bad you were too busy puking all over me to enjoy it."

She leaned back in bed with a shudder. "Better you than that disgusting old man, I guess," she said. "Hang on, I threw up?"

"And passed out again. Normal 'sick person' sleep, though. You missed him laughing at me for ten minutes and then sending me down to the river to wash my shirt. Do you even _know_ how much of a pain in the ass it is to wash a shirt in a river? It finally dried out, like, yesterday. And then we had to wait for the rest of the bad-fairy stuff to cycle out of your system. You were really sick, Case." He stared at his hands in his lap, and she took that to mean he'd been worried enough that he didn't want her to see his reaction.

"It's just so strange..." she said thoughtfully. "None of this makes any sense."

"Seriously," he said in agreement. "I mean, what is that guy's _problem_? I'm awesome. How can he not see that?"

Wrinkling her nose, she just gave him a _look_. "I was actually talking about the fact that we seem to have fallen into a magical world with fairies and self-locking doors. And we don't know how to get home. Mom and George must be going out of their minds -- we've been gone for almost a _week_."

"I hope Marti got home okay." His voice was soft and hesitant, dropping the façade of calm for the moment. "I hope the door opening was just a one-time deal."

She sucked in her breath through her teeth. "Gosh, I didn't even think about that."

"It was all I could think about while you were out," Derek confessed. "I mean, it was bad enough being stranded here with you, and then you were... not here, and I just kept imagining her wandering through the forest forever. And she'd catch a fairy because she's nine and stupid, and it would bite her, and there wouldn't be anyone to..."

After a long moment, she made an honest effort to give him a comforting smile. "But when Marti opened it, she just found a garden, remember? She opened it, went inside, and came back out without getting locked in. Maybe it just went weird because we were there."

"Huh."

"Which, of course, begs the question of why," she said in a thoughtful voice. Now that she'd started thinking along those lines, her mind was spinning circles around itself. "I mean, why _us_?"

"So what you're asking is: who have we pissed off and how," he said matter-of-factly with a wide smirk.

She frowned. "Derek, I'm serious."

"So'm I, Casey. Have you looked around this place? If the magic door wanted to send us here for some reason, the only thing I can come up with is that we've done something really bad to deserve it."

She couldn't be sure whether he was still teasing or not -- he wasn't smiling any more, but it was possible that his eyes were twinkling at her. She didn't have a lot of experience with twinkling eyes, though; it was equally possible that the light from the window was just hitting his face at a weird angle.

Either way, she didn't have much in the way of a response. "I guess it doesn't really matter," she eventually said. "But for whatever reason we're here, if I don't get out bed soon, I'm going to..." Nothing sufficiently horrible was coming to mind.

"Sit in the bed some more?" he asked with a smirk.

"Shut up, Derek," she replied automatically.

And with that, the moment passed and they were just Casey and Derek again. The surreal nature of their situation faded as they lapsed into their familiar sniping. Although, if she allowed herself to think about it, she wasn't entirely sure that was a _good_ thing.

* * *

Two hours later, she'd finally talked Derek into helping her try to walk.

She was pretty sure he hadn't kept her in bed because of his concern over her well-being, though. It was far more likely he'd just been trying to avoid doing anything. If she was bedridden, then all he had to do was sit nearby and be witty, but if she was going to get up, he'd have to actually expend effort to assist.

Whatever his reasons were, it took way longer than she would have suspected to wear him down. It took threatening to deliberately wet the bed to get his attention.

And she had absolutely no idea how Derek and the crazy old man had taken care of... _that_ while she was unconscious, but she also had absolutely no intention of asking.

At the moment, though, she was way too concerned with not falling flat on her face to worry much about it. Derek was no help whatsoever, of course. He had a desultory arm around her waist and could theoretically catch her if she stumbled, but he wasn't helping to hold her up at all. And damn it, her legs were tired already and she'd only walked about ten feet.

"Where the hell is his _bathroom_, anyway?" she grumbled, trying not to let him know how out of breath she was.

He wouldn't meet her eyes. "Um, Casey, see... the thing is..."

"Oh, no," she said, pieces falling into place. "You're not telling me..."

Finally, his grip tightened around her and she leaned into him as much as she dared. "Yeah," he told her. "Outhouse."

On the one hand, the exercise was probably good for her. She hadn't been out of the bed for more than four days, and she was so weak she felt like she was going to collapse at any second. On the other hand...

An _outhouse_? Ew. In fact, that deserved a whole freaking _ocean_ of 'ew.' Especially if it smelled anything like the old man himself.

She wasn't going to think about it. There was nothing she could do about it, and it wasn't like she was just going to... not go.

As she and Derek shuffled outside, though, a little building loomed ominously. "Is that it?" she asked breathlessly.

"It's not as bad as it could be, Casey," he said, still not looking directly at her. "When I said something about it a couple of days ago, he said he just dug a new hole a few weeks back, so at least..."

"Please don't finish that sentence," she said in a flat voice.

At the door of the outhouse, he finally looked at her, expression distinctly uncomfortable. "So, uh, you don't need any..." he stammered with a deep blush.

_Oh. _

"No," she said quickly. "I think I can manage."

It actually didn't smell as bad as she'd thought it would. Possibly, it had something to do with the fact that the building wasn't airtight. She took the opportunity to lean against the wall and attempt to catch her breath. And she was able to stand up on her own once she was done, so that counted for something, right?

Derek was still beside the door when she opened it, his face neutral. "Do you want to go back in?" he asked.

"It's really pretty out here," she said. "And you don't have to baby-sit me, you know. I can take care of myself."

"Yeah, let's see if you can make it twenty-four hours in this place without poisoning yourself and then we'll talk," he retorted, but there was little sting in it, so she ignored him.

Carefully, she picked her way down the gentle slope to the river, Derek's hand at her elbow the entire time. With a sigh of happiness, she sat on the bank and dabbled her feet in the water. It was icy cold, but somehow it didn't matter. It was just good to be out of the bed. He settled beside her and began systematically shredding the grass at his feet.

After a few moments spent in this fashion, she gave him a sideways look. "Thanks, I guess," she said quietly.

"For what?" he asked, blinking.

"For lots of stuff," she said, feeling increasingly awkward. "I mean, you brought me here, you saved my _life_, and apparently, you've been taking care of me ever since. It's like you spend your entire existence trying to make me mad at you, but when I really need you, there you are."

"Well..." he said, sounding equally uncomfortable with her words. "What would I tell Nora if I just let you die over here? I've got to look out for myself, you know."

"Yeah, well, I appreciate it," she told him, nudging him slightly with her shoulder. "And I won't bring it up ever again. Not even that you had to wake me up... that way."

"_Thank you_," he said with deep conviction.

With a laugh, she leaned down and playfully flicked river water at him. "Mostly, I just can't believe we've gone this long without killing each other."

He rolled his eyes, but he was smiling. "I don't think anyone would believe it if we told them. But face it, Case, you're literally the only person in the whole _world_ that I know. Getting along is kind of necessary right now."

"We _are_ sort of stuck with each other, aren't we?" She stretched out on the riverbank and unsuccessfully tried to stifle a yawn. "I guess that's all right, though. I'd rather be stranded here with you than, say, Marti. Or even Lizzie. They'd both be helpless."

"Yeah, this isn't really what I'd call a kid-friendly place. And you're not doing so hot either," he said, twisting his head around to look down at her. "Are you okay? Because we can go back in if we need to."

"I'm fine, you worrywart," she replied with a frown.

"Mostly I ask because I'm not carrying you back inside if you fall asleep out here."

Plucking a clover stalk, she attempted to throw it at him. "De-rek!"

He grinned. "Hey, I just calls 'em as I sees 'em."

* * *

Three more days. Three more horrible days of Derek fussing over her without actually being helpful in any way. Well... he _did_ fix the occasional meal. And he wouldn't let her brave the outhouse alone even though she'd been walking fine since that first day. Mostly, though, he just sat around and complained about how bored he was.

Fortunately she was saved from having to smother him in his sleep to get him to shut up when the old man came tearing into her bedroom one afternoon, waving a book and shouting something incomprehensible.

Derek looked up from the handful of homemade playing cards he was holding and scowled. She'd had the idea to make the cards that morning in an effort to find something to keep Derek occupied. "Speak English, dude," he said, dropping a card onto the discard pile labeled 'Two of Clubs' in his crabby handwriting.

"De-rek," she said, ignoring the old man's ravings. "Why would you freeze the deck _now_? It's only got, like, two cards in it."

Apparently unconcerned, he just rolled his eyes. "I don't remember a rule about explaining your every strategic move in this particular version of canasta. Suck it up and draw, Case."

"Will you two fools stop playing this child's game and _listen_?" the man shouted.

"It's not a kids' game," Derek told him, sounding wounded. "Casey learned this game from her _grandma_. It's for old people -- you'd like it, probably."

Lips curling over his teeth in a snarl, the old man made a swipe for Derek's head. As Derek ducked, he knocked the stack of cards off the bed and Casey swore under her breath. Little sheets of paper went flying everywhere.

"Do you have any idea how long it's going to take to find all those?" he asked with a glare. "I don't even know how many there are!"

"A hundred and eight," Casey said before she could stop herself. "Counting the jokers."

Derek opened his mouth to respond -- probably something horrible -- but the old man actually leaned over and covered it with a filthy hand. "Remind me to say a prayer of thanks to every god I've ever heard of once you two are finally out of my house," he told her.

It clicked. "You mean..." she began slowly.

"That's right," the man said. "I've found another door." With a noise of disgust, he released Derek's mouth and wiped his palm on his shirt. "I find it hard to believe that any young woman, even one as senseless as your friend here, would ever seek _you_ as a companion," he told him spitefully.

"Yeah, well, I find it hard to believe you've _ever_ washed that hand. As soon as I taste something worse, I'll let you know what it is," he retorted, making a big show of wiping his tongue off with the collar of his shirt. "And just so you know, Casey and I aren't _companions_."

While she was tempted to make protesting noises about the fact that Derek had said the word 'companions' like it was an incurable disease, she couldn't bring herself to disagree with his assessment. "That's right," she admitted grudgingly. "We're just stuck with each other."

The man regarded them with a skeptical eyebrow. "It doesn't matter," he said. "But to find your way home, you must seek the Island of Fire."

"What?" Derek asked in a disbelieving voice. "Like where all the gay guys go for vacation?"

Leaning over, she thumped him in the back of the head. "Derek, you really _are_ an idiot, you know?"

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Case," he said, sneering.

"The Island of Fire is mentioned in several books," the old man said, interrupting their glaring match. "And after much consultation, I am positive that it is another gateway to your world. One that can possibly be opened."

Casey smiled. "Great. So how do we open it?"

"There was not adequate documentation," he replied with a sigh. "Although it was very clearly stated that the Island of Fire is a doorway based on emotional response rather than on intense magical study."

"So, like, what?" Derek asked. "We just _wish_ to go home?"

The man rolled his eyes. "I highly doubt it, young man. But the key is something you will have to find on your journey."

Those were excellent words to hear. Mostly because they meant that she and Derek were going to get out of this place. Before she even had time to think about it, Casey realized she was on her feet and rummaging in the nearby wardrobe in an effort to find the clothes she'd arrived in.

"How do we get there?" she heard Derek ask.

"I don't know."

"Well, jeez, aren't you just a well of useful information," Derek retorted sarcastically. "I'm sure glad we ran into _you_."

For what was probably approaching the thousandth time, the old man sighed and scowled at him. "You should be. If nothing else, you should be grateful for the simple fact that the keeper of the door is one of very few non-mages that can understand your speech."

"What do you mean?" Casey asked curiously, twisting her head around to stare at him.

"Think about it, girl!" the man snapped. "You two come from a different _world_. Did you really believe we've been speaking the same language?"

"I kind of wondered about that," Derek said. "I mean, you don't have an accent or anything."

Walking over to the wardrobe, the man roughly shoved her out of the way. "What it means is that you two must take care not to speak to anyone if you can avoid it. Your language marks you as outsiders, and we do not live in times that are... kind to strangers." Something in the back of the wardrobe made a loud clanging noise.

"You said you don't know where the Island of Fire is," Derek said. "So do you have any idea of where we should _look_, or are you just going to throw us out with a smile and a wave?"

Viciously, the man yanked a large sack out of the wardrobe and dumped it unceremoniously on the ground. "Go west," he said. "There is a mage in the town not too far from here. He may know more about the Island." Before either of them could come up with a response, he buried his head in the cabinet again.

Casey exchanged a look with Derek. "So, what do you think?" she asked quietly.

He shrugged. "What choice do we have? I mean, I doubt _you_ want to stay here either."

Involuntarily, she shuddered.

"I didn't think so," he said with a smirk.

Another bag -- not quite so big but apparently quite heavy -- flew out of the wardrobe and landed on the floor with an audible rattle. "You'll need these," the man said, pointing at the sacks. "The larger one for the girl, I think." He gave them speculative looks. "At least, to begin with."

"What--?" she began.

Flapping his hand, he cut her off. "I'm not about to send you off empty-handed, child. You'd be dead before sundown."

"So we're leaving now?" she asked.

"If you would be so kind," he said with a nod. "My generosity can only stretch so far. Besides, it will take several days to reach the town on foot, and you do not have time to spare, I don't think." He handed her another bundle that turned out to be her clothes.

"We go west," she said. "And we don't talk to anyone if we can help it. And we're looking for the Island of Fire."

"I wish you luck in your travels," the man said, watching Derek pick up the sacks. He fumbled with the smaller, heavier one and dropped it on his foot, swearing loudly. "You're going to need it."

* * *


	4. Who Kicked Them Out For Being Annoying

A/N: Sorry it took me a couple more days than usual to get this out -- I've been battling the plague.

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Four: Who Kicked Them Out For Being Annoying

Derek hadn't ever been a Boy Scout or anything, so when the old man told them to go west, he was relying on Casey to pull something out of her hat. Like maybe a compass.

But as they made their way out the door of the cottage, dragging their bags, he was sort of surprised to see her turn to the old man with what he could have sworn was a blush. "So... do the suns rise in the east here, or is that just on Earth?"

"You two don't know which way west is, do you," the man stated flatly. It wasn't really a question.

And yet, he felt somehow compelled to answer anyway. "We don't usually need to," he said. "We've got GPS and stuff."

"That way," the man said, ignoring Derek and pointing in what had been -- up until now -- a totally random direction. "Basically, if you follow the river upstream, you will find your way into town."

"Great," Casey said brightly. "Well, thanks so much for--"

The door slammed in their faces.

After a long pause, he turned to her with a wide smile. "You know..." he said thoughtfully. "I'm really going to miss that old guy. I think he was really starting to warm to me by the end there."

"Yeah, I could tell," she said, matching his smile with a fake grin of her own. "The way he almost broke my nose with the door really hinted at some hidden fondness there. For you in particular."

"We'd better get going," he told her, hitching his bag over his shoulder. "As much fun as this is, he said it would take a few days to get there, and we should use the daylight we've got left."

She sighed and picked up her own sack. "More walking at night."

"Well, _you_ can if you want," he said, heading toward the river. "Me, I plan on sleeping."

They walked in silence until the old man's house was just a blur among the trees. The backs of Derek's knees hurt where his bag kept slamming into them. After a while, he couldn't stand it any longer and just dropped the thing to the ground -- he heard the distinctive sound of metal clanging against metal.

Casey raised an eyebrow. "What, too heavy?" She made an obvious effort to demonstrate how light her own burden was by hefting it higher in the air but only managed to poke herself in the back of the head. "Damn it!" she cried. "This stupid thing is too _big_!"

With a short laugh, he just leaned down and started to untie his bag. "I just want to see what it is," he said. "Other than heavier than a bag of bricks."

"Like _you've_ ever carried around bricks," she scoffed. But he noticed she began opening hers as well. "Holy..." she trailed off, staring down into her bag.

In response, Derek just reached into his and pulled out a sword. "What the..." He turned it over in his hands, watching the sunlight glint on the metal.

When he turned around, he saw that Casey was holding a longbow nearly as tall as she was, staring at it with wide eyes. As soon as she noticed him watching her, she blushed and stuffed the thing back in the sack. "Come on," she said fiercely, snatching his wrist and dragging him back the way they came. His sword hung loosely from his hand, its tip dragging through the dirt as they walked, picking up speed.

Before long, they were running. He could hear her panting but decided not to comment on it.

"Hey!" she cried as soon as they were within sight of the cottage. "Hey, you! You can't just give us stuff like this without an explanation."

It occurred to Derek that they'd lived with the old man for more than a week and never knew his name. Weird.

She was banging on the door with her fist now, yelling at the top of her lungs.

"Casey?" he asked carefully. "Maybe you should just..."

But the door gave way under her hand, swinging open with a rusty creak.

The cottage was empty.

* * *

Not just empty, he learned as soon as he'd worked up enough courage to step inside. Freaking _abandoned_. Everything was covered in years' worth of dust. The bedroom that Casey slept in while she was sick was so cluttered with broken old sticks of furniture that they couldn't do much more than peek in the doorway.

"This doesn't make any sense," he told her, looking back and forth between the fireplace flooded with rat droppings and his shiny new sword. "I mean, we were here, like, less than two hours ago. There was a fire burning, and he was cooking something horrific for dinner. He _lived_ here!"

"Well," she began quietly, "at least there aren't any footprints."

"Huh?" he asked, mystified.

She frowned and shook her head. "It's just... in these kinds of stories, when they go back, they always find their own footprints in the dust. Like maybe they _did_ stay there but they were hallucinating or something. At least that didn't happen."

With an incredulous look in her direction, he fumbled for a sufficiently calm response. "Hallucination? As far as I'm concerned, everything that's happened since we fell through that fucking door has been one big acid trip. Casey, we've spent the last however long hanging out in a world with two suns, biting fairies, and crazy old men who hand out random weapons and then disappear! It's the weirdest dream I've ever had, and as soon as I can figure out how to wake up--"

"Come on, Derek," she said, cutting him off dismissively. "You're nowhere _near_ creative enough to dream this place up."

"Okay," he said desperately, ignoring the implied insult with what he considered unprecedented generosity on his part, "maybe we're stuck in _your_ dream, then. Although, Case, I have to wonder at your motive in giving me a sword."

"Because both of us having the same insane dream is _so_ much more plausible than what I said," she replied with an eye roll. "Jesus, Derek. Denial much?"

"See? More proof," he cried, knowing he sounded hysterical but not caring in the slightest. "You don't talk like that. You've _never_ talked like that!"

Sighing, she leaned over and put a hand on his shoulder. "Consider this fair warning, Derek. If you don't calm down, I'm going to have to smack you. And I'll enjoy it."

He forced himself to take a few deep breaths. It helped a little, but not much. "All right, then, little Miss Expert. What do we do now?"

"We have to decide whether or not to follow his directions to the town," she said. "The Fire thing can wait until we get there."

"That guy didn't even exist," he said dully. "The town probably doesn't either."

Tilting her head, she gave him a look he couldn't quite decipher. "Yeah, well, what do we have to lose if we check it out?"

"Our lives? Our sanity? Take your freaking _pick_."

"Derek, face it." Her voice was gentle, which meant that he totally wasn't going to like what she was about to say. "We don't have any better ideas."

She was right, which pissed him off to no end. Frustrated, he took a swipe at a broken-down old table with his sword. It sank deep into the wood and he pulled it free with a loud grunt. "What?" he asked defensively as she smirked at his antics.

"I was just wondering why he gave _you_ that sword. Twenty bucks says you'll accidentally cut off a finger with it."

He pointed it at her with a mocking glare. "Just hope the finger I cut off isn't yours, Spacey."

* * *

By mutual agreement, they went back to where they'd dropped the sacks and explored them more fully. In his, Derek found a scabbard and belt; it took him more than thirty minutes to figure out how to put the damn things on. He might have gotten it sooner, but Casey's laughter made him clumsy with irritation.

It was his turn to laugh, though, as she began going through her own bag. A longbow, a quiver of arrows, and a small dagger all tumbled out, and she dumped the quiver out no less than five times in her efforts to sling it over her shoulder. Not to mention the fact that she came perilously close to poking her own eye out with the tip of the bow.

"I kind of wonder what made him think we needed weapons," she said thoughtfully, slipping the dagger into her pocket.

"Maybe he thought it would make people leave us alone. Make us look more tough or something," he said.

She raised an eyebrow at him.

Okay, so maybe slinging a sword over a ratty t-shirt and a battered pair of shorts didn't really scream _badass_, but you had to start somewhere, right? "Oh, yeah," she said sarcastically. "We both look pretty scary. I bet no one will mess with us."

"I hope they don't," he told her. "Just because I got handed a sword doesn't mean I know what to do with it. And I bet your little present doesn't come with free archery lessons either."

Scuffing her sneakers in the dirt, she shrugged. "In stories, people find stuff for a reason."

"You keep saying that," he pointed out.

"What?"

"_In stories_. All joking aside, I thought we'd pretty firmly established that however ridiculous all this is, it's reality," he said. "But you keep bringing up stories and how stuff goes. Are you stuck in mental Fantasy-land too?"

With a deep blush, she muttered something so softly he couldn't begin to make it out.

"What was that?" he asked, grinning and cupping his hand around his ear. "I couldn't hear you, Casey."

"Didn't you _ever_ read fairy tales as a kid?" she retorted with a dirty look.

He shrugged. "I'm a guy. I read comics and 'Choose Your Own Adventure' books when I was a kid."

Sighing, she just rolled her eyes. "Okay, we'll discuss your sexist attitude toward children's literature later."

"Oh, goody," he said sarcastically. After a pause, though, he tried again. " Marti likes fairy tales, but apparently I do the voices all wrong, so she doesn't let me read those to her much. I remember one about a mermaid who fell in love with the wrong guy and then died. Marti wouldn't sleep for, like, a week because she thought she'd turn into seafoam before she woke up."

"That's a sad one," she said with an unreadable expression. "It always made me cry. So when I read those stories to Lizzie, I changed the ending. I don't know if she ever went back and read the real one, but she told me once that was her favorite fairy tale."

He shot her a goofy grin. "Let me guess -- she married the prince and lived happily ever after?"

"Actually," she said with an oddly elegant snort, "she decided she didn't need to define herself in terms of a relationship with a man and became the first mermaid doctor in that part of the world." Casey laughed at his dumbfounded expression. "Come on, Derek, is it all _that_ surprising?"

_Yes_, he wanted to say but didn't. He could see Casey changing the ending like that, but he could in no way see Lizzie accepting it. But maybe the reason he knew she wouldn't fall for that sort of thing now was because Casey used to tell her stories about mermaid doctors instead of dying seafoam. He also briefly sort of wondered what kind of stories Casey told Marti, if any.

"Guess not," he finally settled on saying.

"Thanks for that," she replied flatly. "But I was trying to make a point before we got sidetracked."

"Which was?"

Her posture suggested that she was nervous and he resolved not to say anything insulting about her idea unless she _actually_ deserved it.

"I know it sounds stupid, so let me finish before you start in on me," she said in a rush. "But I was thinking that what's been happening sounds a lot like a fairy tale. A _real_ one."

Long pause.

"Was that it?" Derek said cautiously into the silence.

There was relief in her eyes as he spoke and he was startled to realize that it bothered him. "Well, think about it," she continued, sounding more confident. "There's a mysterious hedge in the middle of nowhere, and when we fall through the door, we wind up in a _magical world_."

This last was said in such a gratingly sarcastic tone that he couldn't help laughing in agreement.

"And now we're on an _adventure_," she said wryly. "With swords."

"So what does that mean?" he asked. "Apart from the fact that somebody somewhere has a shitty sense of humor."

Shrugging, Casey gestured in the air theatrically. "Maybe it means that this horrible place has rules like fairy tales."

"Rules?" It occurred to him that he was starting to feel really stupid about all of this stuff.

She rolled her eyes. "I know you've seen _Scream_, Derek. Think about it."

"So, horror rules and stuff? Like 'have sex and die?' That's okay -- I don't see any hot girls popping out of the trees and offering to make a man out of me," he said, grinning flirtatiously.

With an exasperated sigh, she punched him in the shoulder. "How did you get this far in life without stepping in front of a speeding bus, you moron?"

And now, the vague suspicion of his own stupidity was beginning to turn into frustration. "Hey!" he protested. "I already _said_ I don't know much about your damned fairy tales."

She huffed. "Well, okay... you know how in a lot of stories there's always that kindly old man or woman that takes the hero in, offering food, shelter, and wisdom?"

"Yeah?" That sounded sort of familiar at least.

"I think weird, smelly guy was the bizarro-world version," she said pointedly.

"Oh my _God_, so you thought he smelled too?" he asked with a grimace. "It was like having to live with a gym sock wrapped in old bacon. At least _you_ got to be unconscious most of the time."

"Derek. _Focus_."

He smiled widely. "I'm plenty focused, Case. You just called me a hero. So crazy dude was, like, Yoda to my Luke Skywalker or something?"

With an uncomfortable expression, she waved her hands around again. "I wouldn't say _hero_ hero... I meant it more generically. Like it applies to me, too."

"Oh, no. You can't take it back now. Besides, I've got the big-ass sword to prove it. You didn't get a sword, now did you?" To make a point, he playfully jabbed the tip of his sword toward a nearby tree. It would have been a totally awesome gesture, except that he tripped on a rock and wound up wedging the blade in a tree stump. "Aww... _man_..."

"My _hero_," she drawled with an ironic grin that made him want to say something really horrible to her.

"Sure, like you've ever held a bow and arrow in your entire life," he said, grunting as he attempted to yank the sword free. How the hell had he managed to stick it in that far? "There's no way _you're_ supposed to be the hero in _my_ story."

With her hands on her hips, she just shook her head at him. "At the risk of quoting someone as dumb as you, Derek, correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought we'd established that this is reality, not _your_ story."

His arms were starting to get tired. "But you just said--"

"I said that this weird place might follow fairy tale _rules_, not that we were caught in a fairy tale," she said chidingly.

Was it his imagination or did he feel the blade wiggle a little? "So what now?" he gasped between tugs.

She shrugged. "We make sure to share with strangers, we don't stray from the path, and we make sure to stay together."

"Basically, what you're saying is that we do what we would have done anyway," he said. With an awful ripping sound, his sword finally came free. Stumbling, he fell flat on his ass and almost took out his own eye with the flailing sword.

Casey bit her lip around an obvious smirk and he scowled.

"Don't. You. Dare," he said menacingly. "Or I'll... I'll..."

"Fall on your ass again?" she asked, eyes twinkling. "Sorry, Derek. I just... couldn't resist."

He growled at her and picked himself up.

"What I meant with the fairy tale stuff is that things we would have done anyway might have strange consequences," she said, clearing her throat and staring at the ground in a clear effort to avoid eye contact. "Like sharing food with a stranger might get us something we have to have to go home."

"Or how kissing a girl wakes her up out of a coma," he said without thinking.

She gave him an odd look. "Yeah, okay. That too. But the biggest thing is that we _can't_ get separated."

"Now, wait a sec," he said with a frown. "Everything I remember reading about says that each person in these kinds of stories makes their own path. Like, they flip a coin at a crossroad or something."

"Which story was _that_?" she asked curiously.

"I don't remember," he admitted with a shrug. "But there were cabbages. Anyway, maybe we _should_ go our own ways and try to meet up together in the town."

"Nuh-uh," she said, shaking her head emphatically. "Fairy tales are all about learning a lesson. I'd bet anything that the instant we separated, something would happen that we could only survive by working _together_."

"Why?"

Again, she looked down at the ground. "It's just a guess, but it's mostly because we fell through the door together. When Marti was alone, it was just a regular door. A weird, random door," she said quickly to his quizzical look, "but it didn't take her to another universe. It only worked because there were two of us. So I bet getting back means that there still has to be two of us."

"That's..." he began pensively. "That sucks. What lesson are we supposed to learn from that?"

She offered him a half-smile. "How to work together, maybe?"

Grimacing, he stuck his sword in the sheath belted around his waist. "We already know how to work together. The secret is in all the shouting."

"And the occasional kick to the shin," she agreed with a bitter laugh.

* * *

The suns were much lower in the sky when they stopped again. "Maybe we should just quit walking for the day," he said, studying the horizon. "Once the suns start going down, it's going to get dark fast. And it's not so bad here. We're close to the water, and the ground looks okay to sleep on."

She raised an eyebrow.

"It's not, like, a rock garden," he said defensively. "Besides, I know I'm tired. You have to be."

"I'm just as--" she began in an indignant tone.

He rolled his eyes. "I _meant_ that you're probably still on the mend from, like, spending four days in bed," he interrupted with a pointed look. "Maybe there are some of those strawberries or something nearby."

Casey unslung her bow and regarded it with a distasteful expression. "Maybe I could try to shoot something with _this_."

"Hey, yeah," he said. "That's not a bad idea. Give me the bow and I'll find us something to eat. You can set up camp. I like plenty of firewood next to my bedside."

He saw her hand tighten around the handle. "No way. The crazy old guy gave this to me. You don't see me trying to take away your stupid sword, do you?"

"Casey, Casey, Casey," he said, shaking his head and sighing mockingly. "When will you figure out that us Venturis have the superior physical edge over you McDonald-types in every possible way? Hand it over!"

"I have a better idea," she said with a scowl. "How about you go off and look for your dumb firewood, and _I'll_ go get us something to eat?"

Folding his arms over his chest, he just stared at her. "What's my incentive?" he asked.

"I'll shoot you in the foot," she replied evenly, taking an arrow out of her quiver and nocking it on the string.

"You'd miss," he said, trying really hard not to blink at how expert her motion appeared.

With a sweet smile, she pulled it back a little. "Wanna bet?"

"Or," he said in a voice that was not nervous in any way, because it would be stupid for him to be afraid of dumb old Casey and she'd probably miss if he let her, but if she hit him it would be sad because she'd have to find her way home all on her own, "we could actually _see_ who's better. It doesn't make sense for you to go off and lose all the arrows shooting at a rabbit or something when _I_ could do it with just a couple."

"You're not really helping your case, you know," she told him blandly, not moving an inch.

"Well, maybe you could be slightly better at the whole archery thing than I'd imagine," he conceded.

Her lips twitched. "How about we use that tree over there as a target?"

There were a _lot_ of trees around. "Which one?"

"The one that sort of looks like an oak," she said.

"And just in case I didn't know what an oak tree looked like..."

She rolled her eyes. "Jeez, Derek. How you managed to graduate I'll never know."

With a grin and a wink, he slid the bow out of her hands before she had time to react. "Charm will get you surprisingly far in life, Casey."

Nothing in the world could have forced him to admit it, but this was the first time he'd ever actually held a real bow. The plastic one he'd had when he was five didn't count; besides, his dad took it away the third time he tried to shoot Edwin with it. He never understood why that was such a big deal -- the arrows were made of foam and didn't even have pointy tips. The arrow had bounced off Edwin's eye socket and the kid had actually _laughed_ and clapped his hands.

Anyway. The bow he was holding right now felt strangely heavy. Not as heavy as his sword, of course, but it was really awkward to hold. He nocked an arrow like he'd seen Casey do and pulled it back experimentally. It was kind of hard to pull back, too. Huh. Casey had made it look pretty easy.

"Which way?" he asked, twisting around in place. "That big tree trunk over there?"

Sighing, she just waved her hand. "The one nowhere near the oak? Well, why not?"

As he tried to take aim, he noticed that his hands were trembling with exertion. This was a _lot_ harder than he'd thought. He held the whole thing away from his body slightly, instinctively realizing that if it was that difficult to pull back the string, it would hurt like hell if the string happened to snap against his skin. So it was quite likely that when he released his hand, he hadn't aimed as well as he could have.

Which was the only explanation for why he missed the tree _so_ spectacularly.

It wasn't even a near miss. The damned arrow must have turned in the air somehow, flying off at a ninety-degree angle and sticking in the mud on the riverbank to his left.

"Superior physical edge, huh?" Casey said, the laughter in her voice unmistakable.

He knew he was being childish, but he didn't care. He threw the bow to the ground and shot her a glare. "Let's see _you_ do any better."

Sliding another arrow out of her quiver, she picked up the bow and set herself up. As soon as she resumed her stance, Derek realized he was probably in trouble -- she _had_ done archery before. Maybe not much, but enough that when she took aim with a steady hand, he knew he'd lost.

The string twanged and the arrow flew through the air gracefully. It hit the tree trunk at a glancing angle, flying off into the leaves. Not really a hit, but a hell of a lot better than his.

But the effect was somewhat spoiled as Casey immediately started jumping up and down, clutching at her left arm. "_Fuck_!" she screamed. "Fucking son of a..."

He quirked an eyebrow. "Case?"

With another loud expletive, she threw the bow down just like he had earlier. "I _hate_ it when these things do that," she said, kicking at the tip so it spun around in the dirt.

"Do _what_?" he asked, starting to get frustrated. "Are you, like, dying or something?"

She showed him the inside of her forearm, now turning an angry shade of red. "When I was a kid, I went to summer camp once, and they made me do archery, and the damn bowstring snapped across my arm _then_, too. I had a bruise for a month!"

Unless he knew a lot less about injuries than he thought he did, she was going to have a bruise for a month this time too. "So you _do_ know how to shoot a bow and arrow," he said, choosing not to make fun of her klutziness. "You kind of held the bow like you knew what you were doing."

"Yeah, well, I don't," she said, shaking her arm. "That was probably the... fifth time I've _ever_ shot an arrow in my entire life. And that's being generous. After the first day at camp, the counselors wouldn't let me go to archery any more."

"Why?" he asked.

With a frown, she leaned over and picked up her bow, slinging it over her shoulder again. "Promise you won't laugh?"

"No," he said honestly.

"I accidentally shot the instructor in the arm," she said with a deep blush. "It wasn't my fault, either. I was aiming for the target, and she came over to correct something, but when she said my name, I turned and tripped and..."

He'd halfway promised not to laugh, damn it. Biting his lip frantically, he breathed in and out through his nose until the urge to collapse in hysterics passed.

"So I'm not any good with this sort of thing," she said, idly plucking at the string. "But how sad is it that I'm better at it than _you_?"

He smirked. "See, here's the difference between you and me, Casey. You know you're at the top of your game, but me, I'm just beginning. I give it two days before I kick your ass in target practice."

"Two days, huh? What am I supposed to do in the meantime?" she asked wryly.

"Well, you won, so that means you get to go hunting. Go get 'em, tiger," he said with a chipper wave of the hand. "I'll be taking a nap, I think. Followed by a prolonged wade in the river."

"You could build a fire," she said.

Shrugging, he just started spreading one of the empty sacks out on the ground. "I'm just an ignorant city boy. You're the one who went to summer camp, Firestarter."

"I can't believe I let you talk me into these things, Derek," she said angrily, shaking her head.

"Actually," he admitted, "neither can I."

* * *


	5. So They Wandered Through the Forest

A/N: A few things here. One: thanks for being patient with my slow posting; when life gets hectic, fandom is the first thing to go by the wayside. Two: this particular chapter kind of ran away with its bad self, so not only is it long as hell, it went in several different directions. Three: as always, thanks for reading and enjoy!

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Five: So They Wandered Through the Forest

It wasn't fair. Even when she won, she managed to lose somehow.

Briefly, Casey wondered if Derek even knew how miserable trying to hunt was. Probably not, although it didn't make her feel any less tricked. But it was looking more and more like she was the seasoned outdoors-person between the two of them. Given that her outdoors experience was limited to the two weeks of summer camp she'd attended nine years ago, that was just depressing.

And she'd hated camp, too. The bugs, the burned campfire food, the lack of proper washroom facilities -- even arts and crafts had been awful. Crafts had been conducted by an ex-military man who believed in teaching them 'survival skills.' Like carving functioning weapons out of bars of soap and creating a length of sturdy rope with nothing but an old t-shirt, a dozen dandelion stems, and a pocketknife. Weaving her dandelions into a pretty crown had earned her twenty push-ups and a mentally unbalanced diatribe on how flower chains weren't going to help them out in the wilderness.

When her mom came to pick her up on the last day, she'd been in the car with her bags before Nora had a chance to even turn off the engine. A couple of years later, she'd heard through the grapevine that the arts-and-crafts teacher had finally been dismissed from the camp, but it didn't really make her feel any better.

So, no, Casey didn't _do_ camping. Or outdoors. Or anything that might take her back to a hot, overcrowded arts-and-crafts room, her nose against the floor while the most terrifying man she'd ever met screamed in her ear.

Which was why she was kind of confused about her reasons for arguing with Derek in the first place. She should have just let him have the stupid bow. And she _would_ have, if he hadn't taunted her about her incompetence. She just couldn't let a chance to one-up him pass.

And what did it get her? Crouching in a bush, with thorns poking her in the back, and a numb left leg from keeping all of her weight on it for more than an hour. She'd seen a couple of animals walk through the clearing she'd picked, but every time she tried to take aim, her bush rustled and whatever it was she wanted to shoot took off. This was her fifth bush, and she was officially fed up.

What was worse, the suns were starting to going down. Before too long, it was going to be so dark she didn't even think she'd be able to find her way back to their campsite, such as it was. She still had some time, but not much.

Not to mention the fact that she'd already lost four arrows to her efforts, and Derek's voice still echoed in her head.

_It doesn't make sense for you to go off and lose all the arrows shooting at a rabbit or something..._

Stupid Derek. As if _he_ could do any better.

She hated the way he'd say something like that without so much as a second thought, but it would stick in her head. It happened way too often, and the idea of what basically amounted to living her life according to Derek Venturi's smartass comments was nauseating.

Because more often than not -- like right now -- he was right. It didn't make sense for her to waste all the arrows.

While no one could have forced her to admit it, Casey secretly suspected the old man gave her a bow for a very specific reason. Derek had been sufficiently awed of his own sword to not give it any deeper thought, but the implications were unsettling. They had been given deadly weapons -- they'd likely have to use them. And generally, swords weren't used to bring down deer.

So she wanted to hang on to all the arrows she could. Just in case.

Sighing and scaring off the strange-yet-cute little fuzzy creature grazing at the other end of the clearing, Casey stood up and started attempting to untangle her hair from the briars she'd been more or less sitting in, grumbling under her breath.

As if on cue, her stomach growled, reminding her that they _did_ need to eat, no matter how crappy her skills as a hunter were. Not to mention how much grief Derek would give her for coming back empty-handed.

Casey thought as she walked. There wasn't enough time to go foraging, and their sacks hadn't held anything she would have considered essential for a multi-day hike -- clothing, bedding, _food_, and so on. And as far as she knew, the grass wasn't particularly edible.

She found the riverbank, knowing the best way to get back to camp was by following the river downstream. One of the suns sparkled across the water, and she saw silvery flashes underneath.

_Fish..._

Carefully, she pulled off her sneakers and put them on the bank. Unslinging her bow and quiver, they went beside her shoes. With a single arrow in her left hand, she waded into the river until the water was up to her thighs, just barely wetting the hems of her shorts.

"What the hell did Mr. Richardson say about refraction?" she mumbled to herself. "Is it above or below... let's see... if you go from low to high, the light bends closer..."

She forced herself to stand as still as possible, the tip of her arrow pointing at the surface of the water. A fish at least as long as her forearm swam lazily toward her, and she held her breath, tensing for the strike.

As quickly as she could, she jabbed the arrow down into the water, aiming just beneath the fish. She missed, of course, and watched it dart away, but she could afford to be a little patient.

Not even a dozen tries later, she _didn't_ miss, and the arrow punctured a fish's skin right below its gills, coming out the other side of its head and basically pinning it to the riverbed.

With a deep breath, she snatched up the whole thing -- fish and arrow -- and ran out of the water, throwing the fish on the ground. She looked away as it flopped around, suffocating and injured, and chose instead to study the cuts on her hands that the fish's fins had made as it struggled in her grip.

Soon enough, though, it went still. Casey told herself that the circle of life was an essential part to the functioning of nature and pulled out her arrow, cleaning it off in the water and putting it back in the quiver. She was really glad that she'd managed to catch a fish big enough to feed both of them -- she wasn't looking forward to doing _that_ again.

And the suns were almost gone. By the time she found her way back to camp, it was totally dark.

Derek was propped lazily on a tree stump, looking down into...

A fire?

There was a stack of wood and a brightly burning _fire_! Under her incredulous stare, a spark popped and landed at her feet.

"You built a fire?" she heard herself ask as if from a long way away.

"I did," he said, not looking up.

"But... but _how_?" she stammered.

He shrugged. "It's not that hard." Finally glancing at her, he smirked. "So you _did_ manage to shoot something. Some weird land-walking fish I've never heard about?"

She felt a blush spread across her cheeks and told herself firmly that Derek wasn't worth her embarrassment. It didn't work. "If you don't want to eat any, you just have to say," she replied in a lofty tone, hugging her kill to her chest.

"Oh, I didn't say that. Although now that you mention it, how _do_ we eat it? Because sushi? Not too appealing at the moment." He made a face but didn't move to help her in any way.

Not, of course, that she was expecting it. "Find a stick long and thin enough to skewer this thing, but strong enough that it won't break," she told him, pulling her dagger out of her pocket and walking back toward the water.

He ignored her instructions and instead stood and followed her. "What are you doing?" he asked, watching her thrust the dead fish under the water, more or less washing off the grime it acquired during its demise.

"Gutting it," she said matter-of-factly. "Here."

She showed him how to hold the fish up by its gills so she could slit the belly open. Amazed at her own actions, she quickly pulled out the guts and kidney line, throwing them in the water.

"Oh, that's _really_ gross," Derek said, face turning a faint shade of green. "Where the hell did you learn how to do this anyway?"

And she was nine years old again, back on that dusty floor, a splinter in the palm of her right hand, and Captain McInnis was yelling at her to grow up and act like a soldier. "Survival skills," she said shortly, making two cuts around the dorsal fin and de-boning it with a smooth jerk. "Now, go find that stick if you want to eat."

* * *

"For the millionth time, Casey, you're being a freaking idiot about this," Derek said loudly.

Ignoring him, she just pulled her sack more tightly around her shoulders.

"I mean, it gets cold at night around here, and all we've got for shelter are two old, stinky bags. Did it occur to you that _I_ might be cold too?"

She sniffed and tried to stretch the cloth to cover her bare legs.

"All right, Casey, I'm done arguing with you." Was it her imagination, or did his voice sound closer?

A warm body hit her back and she let out a shriek. His arms wrapped around her and effectively held her to the ground. "De-rek!" she shouted as loudly as she could, aiming for his ear.

"We can't keep the fire going through the night, and I'm already freezing my ass off, so here's the deal -- we're going to share body heat even if it means I have to stay on top of you all night long," he said fiercely.

"You're _disgusting_," she said, attempting to shove him away.

He rolled his eyes. "_You're_ apparently the one with the dirty mind, Case. I'm just trying to be practical. Believe me, if we had a warm, cozy bed, I'd be the first one to make you sleep on the floor. As it is, we have to make do."

"I hate my life," she muttered, giving up her struggles and going limp.

"That's my girl," he said with a grin.

"If you try anything..." she warned, trailing off as she realized that she was already feeling more comfortable. Damn it.

"Hey," he retorted, wrapping her in a full-body hug and draping the sacks over the two of them as best as they could manage, "been there, done that, got puked on. Moving on."

She turned in his arms so that she could press her face against his blessedly warm skin. "Good. Because I'd puke on you again in an instant."

* * *

"Ow!" she cried, waking with a start. "De-rek!"

He'd kicked her _again_. She didn't actually know how many times he'd woken her up with his tossing and turning, but if it happened one more time, she was going to smother him in his sleep.

"You asshole," she whispered, jabbing him in the ribs with her elbow. "Turn over and kick something else!"

After a prod hard enough to leave a bruise, he _finally_ rolled over onto his other side.

Which was when the full-on snoring started.

Sighing, Casey just stuck her fingers in her ears and closed her eyes.

* * *

Someone was banging rocks together right next to her head. Probably Derek.

Casey opened her eyes to tell him to shut up if he valued his life at _all_, but in the faint light of dawn, she saw that what she'd heard was actually the sound of his teeth chattering.

At some point, in between the kicking and swearing, she'd rolled about two feet away from him, taking both of the sacks with her. She had no idea how long he had been lying there, exposed to the cold, but something in her chest twinged at the thought.

She also had no idea how he'd managed to sleep through that sort of discomfort, but it wasn't her business anyway.

"If you tell _anyone_ about this," she said to the sleeping Derek, "I swear I'll shoot an arrow in your ass."

With the makeshift blankets in tow, she scooted back over to him and wrapped her arms around his cold shoulders, rubbing briskly until the chattering stopped.

And he still didn't wake up.

"You're dumb even when you're asleep," she muttered, burying her face into the crook of his neck and closing her eyes.

* * *

"Hey... Casey..." someone drawled in a seductive voice, really close to her ear.

She groaned. _Too early. Not enough sleep. Stupid Derek and his stupid snoring. _

"Has anyone ever told you that you look really awful in the mornings?" She could feel the warm puffs of breath against her cheek as he spoke.

"I hate you and wish you would drop dead," she said without bothering to open her eyes.

"Aww... does someone need a good-morning cuddle?"

Her eyes snapped open and she shot him a vicious glare. "Don't even think about it."

Smirking, he just reached out and poked her in the stomach with a single finger. "C'mon, up and at 'em, Casey. Time to get a move on."

With another loud groan for good measure, she picked herself up off the ground, wincing as muscles she didn't even know she had ached from a night spent sleeping in the most uncomfortable situation known to mankind. "Why are _you_ so chipper?" she asked irritably, stifling a yawl. "You hate getting up in the mornings."

"The sooner we get going, the sooner we'll get home," he said, slinging their 'blankets' over his shoulder. "Besides, I don't know why, but I slept really well last night."

The sound of his pained yelping as her foot connected with his shin only made her feel a little better.

* * *

"I'm so gonna win today," Derek said confidently. "I can feel it."

"Because you've done _so_ well the last three days we've tried this," she retorted with a sarcastic smile. "Derek, I'm sick of you wasting the arrows."

He shook his head. "Like you've bagged anything, Miss Lets-Just-Eat-Fish-Instead. How many arrows have _you_ lost?"

"You suck at that, too," she grumbled, blushing.

And he did. The second day of walking, they'd both waded into the river with arrows, and Casey had barely been able to catch enough for supper because she was way too busy laughing at him. Not only did he fail to catch so much as a single fish, he spent the majority of his time underwater, trying to regain his balance without swallowing ten gallons of river water.

"It wasn't fair," he said in protest, "you made me go into the slippery part, with all the gross rocks and slime and stuff. You're lucky I didn't crack my head and drown."

"Yeah, _lucky_," she said with a meaningful eyeroll.

"Oh, admit it, Case," he said, "you'd be really broken up if something happened to me out here."

"Only because I'm pretty sure I'll need you to get the key and find our way home." After a moment's thought, she sighed. "And George might get mad if I let you die, which would probably make Mom mad, too, and then she wouldn't let me live off-campus in the fall."

He hefted the bow in a motion that he likely thought made him look as if he knew what he was doing; mostly, he just looked like a moron who'd never held a bow before. "It's nice to know the depth of your compassion for me," he told her sweetly.

"Says the boy who filled all of my dancing shoes with peanut butter a mere three weeks ago," she said mockingly.

"You have no idea how hysterical you look when you're a shrieking banshee," he said. "Even Nora laughed."

She yanked an arrow out of the quiver and thrust it at him. "Only after she saw how much it was going to cost _you_ to replace all of them," she reminded him. "And if you lose this arrow, Derek..."

"Yeah, yeah," he said, flapping his hand at her, "eternal pain and suffering at the hands of Princess Casey. Gotcha."

"Just shut up and miss the stupid target so we can go find something to eat," she said, not even bothering to keep the frustration out of her voice.

Rummaging around in his pockets, he pulled out a long, thin piece of tree bark. "Hang on," he said, "I have to get ready."

"Ready?" she echoed, watching him carefully unthread the shoelace from his left shoe. "How is tree bark going to help?"

With a smile, he just shook his head and started tying the bark onto his left forearm. Once he was done -- and she was officially baffled -- he took a stance that he'd started copying from her at some point over the last couple days and drew the bowstring back, the fletching on the arrow's end touching his cheek.

Her mouth fell open as she realized what he'd done.

Derek released the string with a twang, and the arrow flew neatly through the air, thudding solidly into the tree trunk they'd picked out earlier. The string scraped harmlessly against the bark, leaving his arm completely intact.

"You... you..." she stammered.

"See?" he asked cockily. "I told you I'd win eventually."

"You _cheater_!" she shouted, finding her voice.

He had the audacity to look wounded. "I am not," he said in a sullen tone. "I found a creative solution to a problem plaguing us both. You're just mad 'cause you didn't think of it _first_."

She wanted to hit him. To wipe that damned smirk off his face permanently. Her fingers flexed involuntarily as he plucked an arrow out of the quiver and nocked it in a confident gesture.

"Nothing to it, Spacey," he said, casually taking aim and letting go.

There was a loud crack and an equally loud scream. Derek was on the ground, clutching at his arm. The bark apparently wasn't sturdy enough to last through a second use, and she was pretty sure that not only had he gotten snapped with the string, he'd gotten a couple of splinters for good measure.

"What were you saying again, Derek?" she asked sweetly, squatting down and patting his head. "Right before you screamed? My goodness, that was a very high-pitched--"

"Shut up," he said through gritted teeth. "Just shut up and leave me to die in peace."

Sighing, she poked at his arm until he turned it over. "No one ever died from a splinter, you big baby," she said. "Or even three."

"I can feel the sepsis eating out my insides," he moaned.

As carefully as she could, she squeezed at one of the splinters, easing it out of his skin. "Do you even know what sepsis _is_?"

"I know it can be fatal," he retorted. "Much like an afternoon spent in your delightful company."

She wasn't quite so gentle with the next splinter.

* * *

There was nothing for it. She'd put it off as long as she could, but it had gotten so bad she could smell _herself_.

Not to mention that this morning, Derek woke her up by poking a finger in her ear and whispering, "Casey, you smell like a dead fish."

It helped a little that he did too. Of course they did -- they'd been eating nothing but fish and the occasional strawberry-like fruit for the last four days. And every time she got back with the fish, he'd gotten a fire started somehow. She had no idea how he was doing it, and whenever she asked, he just smirked at her and told her that he only shared important secrets with girls who _didn't_ reek like last week's garbage.

Even if she knew he wouldn't tell her about the fires no matter what, she _had_ to find a way to bathe. They'd stopped earlier than usual today, and she'd done the unthinkable and sent him off with the bow and three arrows, telling him that if he was so sick of fish, he could damn well do something about it himself.

She wasn't really sure how she was going to manage without soap, but anything would make a difference. Quickly, afraid Derek would come back any _second_, she stripped off her clothes and waded into the river up to her neck. The water was like ice and probably wasn't doing any good, but it was the thought that counted, right?

The water wasn't too fast, so she cautiously kicked her feet off the riverbed and swam a few strokes, wetting her face and hair thoroughly. It had been so long since she'd washed her hair that whenever she touched it, her fingers came away slick with grease. Ick.

The books she'd read as a kid never mentioned anything about adventures smelling quite so bad. "Stupid adventure," she muttered, shaking her head and feeling the water lift and separate the strands of hair. "I'd kill for a bar of--"

"Hey, Casey!" she heard someone call. And there was only one someone on the whole face of the planet who knew who she was.

With a shriek, she flipped upright, treading water furiously. "De-rek!" she squeaked. "What are you doing back so soon?"

"I ran out of arrows," he shouted, cupping his hands around his mouth. "Are you fishing?"

It was a good thing he was so far away; he couldn't see how red her face was. "No," she said loudly. "Go away!"

He yanked off his shirt and threw it to the ground. "Are you going swimming? That sounds pretty good, but isn't the water cold?"

"Yes," she said hastily. "It's very cold. You don't want to come in. Why don't you... go find some berries or something? Berries would be good."

"So would swimming," he said, dropping his shorts and kicking off his shoes and socks. Clad only in his boxers, he started to wade in. "What, is the river not big enough for the both of us?"

In despair, she curled up into a little ball, wrapping her arms around her legs. "Something like that," she said. "I'm getting out soon anyway."

Only in up to his ankles, he glanced back at the riverbank and studied her pile of clothes with obvious interest. "Hey, Casey?" he asked slyly.

Maybe God would be merciful and she would drown before he got out here. "What?"

"Are you _naked_?"

She wasn't going to... she wasn't going to... damn it. "De-rek!"

"Because I seem to recall seeing that lovely shade of orange somewhere else," he said in a mocking voice. "At least, apart from sitting on the ground over there."

"Well, maybe _someone_ finally insulted me to the point that I felt obligated to bathe," she retorted, shooting for haughty and winding up somewhere much closer to pathetic. "If that same someone could take a damn _hint_ and let me finish my bath, maybe he wouldn't have to spend tonight sharing body heat with someone who smells like carrion. And if he would take an even _bigger_ hint, maybe I wouldn't either."

He grinned. "Are you telling me I smell bad, Case?"

At least he wasn't walking toward her any more. "Worse than Weird Guy," she said honestly.

"I can take a stupid hint, you know," he said, wading downstream. "I'll rinse off."

If he could take a hint, why wasn't he taking _this_ one? "I need to get out," she said, wincing at the desperate edge to her voice -- she had to get away from him, and she had to do it now. "I really need to get out. Do you mind?"

Folding his arms over his chest, Derek just smiled. "Not at all. Go right on ahead."

"I hate you," she muttered. "Will you get out of here before I go hypothermic and freeze to death?"

"What if I turn around?" he countered. "If I peek, well, I'll let you have my sword."

She began inching her way toward the edge of the river. "You're just saying that because you don't want to carry it around any more."

"That thing is really freaking heavy!" he said. "But seriously, Casey, you can trust me."

Very deliberately, he turned away from her and cocked his head, obviously waiting.

It only took her about four seconds to decide that if Derek wanted a free show, he was going to get one. She hurtled out of the river as fast as she could, falling twice and skinning both her knees. She hesitated for a moment at the thought of putting her grungy clothes back on, but she pushed it down and dressed hastily -- she'd have to figure out how to wash them later. "All right," she finally said.

"You know," he replied, shaking his head and sending water droplets flying, "if I'd wanted to look, I would have done it last week when you were out like a light."

Frowning, she just rolled her eyes. "Christ, Derek."

"See? I _said_ you can trust me," he told her with an earnest expression.

She didn't know what to make of it. In the end, she just ignored it and instead picked up the bow he'd dumped by his clothes and slung it over her shoulder. "I'm going to find food. Take your stupid bath."

"Don't you want to watch, Casey?" he shouted, diving into the water and kicking his feet in the air. "Fair's fair, after all."

Her mouth fell open. "You _asshole_!" she cried. "You said you wouldn't--"

"Oh, my God," he said, cackling and shaking water droplets out of his hair. "You are _so_ gullible. You should see the look on your face right now."

"I'm leaving now," she said tightly, spinning on her heel and marching toward the trees. His laughter echoed in her ears, and she wondered whether or not she really could trust him after all.

* * *

"We're going to die," he said desperately.

She sighed. "Derek, we've been walking for less than a week. Quit being a drama queen."

"We're never going to find that town," he moaned. "We're just going to keep wandering through this horrible forest. It wasn't supposed to end this way -- I had _plans_. I have a hockey scholarship waiting for me back at home. I'm not supposed to die in a stupid magical forest with stupid neurotic Casey."

"_I'm_ neurotic?" she asked, pausing mid-stride to stare at him. "Have you been listening to yourself?"

"And I swear," he continued as if she hadn't even spoken, "if I have to eat one more bite of that damn fish, I'm gonna--"

A twig snapped and Derek spun wildly around in place.

"Did you hear that?" he shrieked.

"A bird, maybe?" she replied, unconcerned. "You've been too busy flipping out to notice, but the forest does make noises, you know."

Another twig.

"But that sounds like..." he said, trailing off as something emerged from the bushes.

Both of them stared, mouths open.

The man was easily more than six-five, clad head-to-toe in battered armor. The armor was impressively faded somehow, suggesting frequent use and frequent success. It was impossible to tell what the man looked like -- if, indeed, it even was a man -- since the visor was down.

Swallowing her fear, Casey forced herself to take a brave step toward the knight. "Um... _hi_," she said.

Nothing. The armor clanked as the knight cocked his head.

"We're..." She gestured between herself and Derek. "We're kind of lost. You wouldn't happen to know the way to town, would you?"

"Casey..." Derek hissed, "are you _nuts_?"

There was a loud rumble coming from within the armor that may or may not have been a voice. It definitely wasn't English, though.

"Don't you remember what that guy told us?" he whispered frantically. "They don't like _outsiders_ here."

"Maybe he's the exception," she said out of the corner of her mouth, pasting a winning smile on her face. "I'm sorry," she told the knight loudly, "I didn't quite catch that."

The visor flipped up and she saw dark eyes and a grinning mouth. It again said something unintelligible.

"If we're taking votes," Derek said, "mine is for running the hell away. Like, now!"

Head turning, the knight said a few words that were obviously meant for Derek.

He stared and Casey realized that for probably the only time in his entire life, Derek was stunned speechless.

After a pause, the knight laughed and reached out to grab Casey's arm. His metal gauntlets scratched her skin painfully.

"Hey!" she cried, trying and failing to pull away. "Let go of me!"

Teeth flashed under the visor and the knight spoke again.

"I'm not..." she spat. "What the fuck do you think you're doing?"

The sound of metal rasping against something got her attention and she stopped struggling. Especially since the noise came from _behind_ her. Spinning, Casey saw Derek brandishing his sword with a fierce expression.

"Derek?" she asked faintly.

"You and me, Case," he said, voice shaking with what she was pretty sure was terror, "we're stuck with each other. I'm not going to let some dude drag you off and leave me out here alone. He takes you away over my dead body."

With a derisive chuckle, the knight answered the obvious challenge by drawing his own sword and releasing her.

"Derek, that's... that's... well, I'm not sure what it is, but don't you think we can figure this out another way?" she asked, scuttling as far away from the knight as she could.

The knight lunged at Derek, who flattened himself to the ground with astonishing speed.

_Guess not. _

Most of the battle consisted of the knight taking swipes at Derek, and Derek ducking out of the way. Every now and again, Derek tried to attack, but the third time the sword was knocked out of his hands because of the force of the knight's blows, he seemed to give up.

The knight's blade flashed in the sunlight and Derek shouted in pain, clapping a hand to his cheek. Laughing again, the knight flung his helmet to the ground and tipped Casey a wink.

He really was going to die.

That idiot was going to let himself get chopped up into little pieces because someone grabbed her arm.

Okay, so she _knew_ the knight hadn't just been planning on a friendly little arm-grabbing session, but it still wasn't a good enough reason for Derek to get himself killed.

With a trembling hand, she unslung her bow and nocked an arrow. She aimed for his left ear and let fly, ignoring the pain as the bowstring bit into her forearm.

And the knight dropped his sword, head swiveling around to stare at her. Or, more correctly, to stare at the arrow now protruding from the little gap in his armor behind his right knee.

"Go away, or this next one ends up in your skull," she said, sounding way more sure of herself than she actually was, placing another arrow on her bowstring.

Bowing mockingly, the knight sheathed his sword and limped into the bushes. He said _something_ upon his retreat, but of course she had no idea what it was. It sounded pretty cutting, though.

"Is he gone?" Derek asked faintly.

"I think so," she replied, her hands and arms beginning to shake in earnest.

"Good." And he collapsed to the ground, coming damn near skewering himself on his own sword.

Before she could blink, she was at his side. "Derek! Are you okay?"

Blood was running down his left cheek. It looked like the knight had sliced into it pretty good; it probably needed stitches. Otherwise, he wasn't _bleeding_ from anywhere else. "My arms feel like they've been yanked out of their sockets," he mumbled. "Who knew swordfighting was so fucking exhausting?"

"Yeah, well, you're lucky you've still got arms at all," she retorted. "What the hell were you thinking, Derek?"

"Hey, I had me some pretty good back-up," he said with a stupid grin. "Nice shootin', tiger."

She wiped at his cheek with the cleanest edge of her shirt. "Between you and me, I was aiming for his head."

He snorted and winced as the motion re-opened his wound.

"Now get up, Sir Lancelot. We need to get going," she said, poking at him until he pulled himself to a seated position.

"Why? Here's as good a place to camp as any. Besides, I've had a busy day; I need a rest," he said with a pout.

Shaking her head, she picked up his sword and handed it to him. "I'd bet anything the knight came from the town."

"So?"

"So," she said, blowing out a frustrated sigh, "all we have to do is walk in the direction he came out of. I bet we'll be in town before nightfall."

His eyes went wide. "You mean you want to walk _toward_ people who probably want to kill us? What if they're all like that knight dude?"

"The old man told us to go to town, and I'm sure he wouldn't send us any place dangerous," she said. At his incredulous look, she cleared her throat. "Well, _probably_."

Sheathing his sword, Derek just sighed and swiped at his cheek. "When we're hanging by our thumbs in the town square, I'm going to remind you that you just said that."

"Hanging by our thumbs?" she echoed. "I thought you said you _didn't_ read fairy tales. And quit messing with your face -- you'll make it worse. You should wash it out at the very least."

"The worst that could happen is I'll get a scar, and I've heard from very reliable sources that chicks dig scars," he said with a smirk, heading over to the river.

She folded her arms over her chest. "Shut up and clean your face, you imbecile. I want to get a move on."

The smirk widened into a full-blown grin. "Hey, Casey?"

"What?" she asked irritably.

"Do _you_ like scars?"

The resounding splash of his body hitting the water was quite satisfying.

* * *


	6. Until They Found a Town

A/N: Okay, so this chapter is long as hell, too. But I _think_ it's the halfway point, as long as nothing changes. Again, thanks for reading and enjoy!

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Six: Until They Found a Town

"Yeah, well, fuck your old fairy tale rules, anyway," he muttered in a sullen voice, slamming the flat of his sword blade against a nearby tree.

"Derek..." she began.

But he was in no mood. The cut on his cheek was itching, and her nagging was seriously pissing him off. "_You_ said that helping strangers would get us where we needed to go. If you were right, that knight would have given us, like, food or directions or something. But what actually happened? You came close to getting raped, and I got a new facial feature."

She paled, and he sort of wished he hadn't pointed out the truth quite so bluntly, but she needed to listen to him for once.

"Casey, we're not in Fantasyland," he said quietly. "Don't you get that we keep getting hurt? If we just go into that town with a smile and a wave, we're probably going to get shot, given our luck."

"I don't think they have guns around here," she said, but it was very subdued, and she kept staring at her feet.

"Casey..." he said, rolling his eyes.

Glaring at him, she just shrugged. He didn't like the helpless expression on her face. "I know, Derek," she said. "I just... I don't even know what I wanted to say."

After a long pause, he smiled. "Hey, how cool is it that _I_ get to be the voice of reason on this one?"

"It _is_ kind of weird," she replied thoughtfully. "I mean, you're the one who ripped another hole in your shorts yesterday trying to use that stupid sword to scratch a bug bite."

"In all fairness, I don't know what bit me. It might not have been a bug," he said smoothly, resuming his efforts to clean said sword with his increasingly filthy shirttail. "All I know is that it's apparently non-lethal. Or, if it _is_ lethal, at least it's a slow killer."

"You're trying to distract me," she said in a flat voice.

_Damn_. "Did it happen to work?" he asked, trying a smile to see how she'd respond.

Nothing. Her lips didn't so much as twitch. "We need to go into the town," she said.

"Casey--"

She cut him off with a fierce glare. "But. We should do it quietly. No sneaking in under the cover of night or whatever, but we need to be as inconspicuous as possible."

He gave her a blank look. Had she just agreed with him?

"Inconspicuous," she repeated, frustration a sharp edge in her tone. "It means low-key, not suspicious, all that. Jeez, Derek, buy a dictionary."

Oh, my _God_. Mentally, he took back every kind thought he'd ever had about her. "Believe it or not," he replied irritably, "I know what inconspicuous means. Quit being so condescending, Casey. That means that you should stop acting like a bitchy princess."

Her eyes went wide and he couldn't tell whether she was hurt or mad. "Eat shit and die," she said in a vicious whisper.

Both, then.

"That was... inappropriately harsh," he said, blinking in surprise. He hadn't said anything all _that_ bad, had he?

She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, well, I've had a really bad two weeks, Derek, and I'm sick and tired of you second-guessing every _fucking_ thing I say."

"Obviously." The word just tumbled out of his mouth and he immediately wished he could take it back.

This time, her eyes actually bulged. "What's your brilliant idea, then, Venturi? If you're so smart, why don't _you_ come up with an idea? Save the day and leave me out of it. Because, apparently, nothing I've said since we've gotten here has been good enough." As she spoke, her cheeks reddened even further and she now appeared to be on the verge of tears.

Which was bad. Very bad.

Crying Casey was helpless-damsel-in-distress Casey and that was _not_ what he needed to be dealing with right now.

"Casey," he yelped, wincing at the desperation even he could hear in his voice. "Casey, that's not what I meant! I just... look, we pick at each other all the time. It's, like, our thing, and it's never bothered you _before_." He gestured wildly with the hand still holding the sword and came close to stabbing her in the shoulder.

"That's because I've never been stuck in an alternate dimension with only _you_ to talk to before," she retorted viciously, a big fat tear running down her cheek. "And put that damn thing down before you actually manage to kill something."

Every instinct in his body fought the command, but he willed himself to obey. He could give her that much at least. But it wasn't fair, really. _He_ flipped out, and she just glared at him and told him to grow up. _She_ flipped out, though, and he had to literally drop everything and tend to her bruised psyche.

Which, in a weird nutshell, illustrated everything that drove him up the freaking _wall_ about Casey McDonald.

"I'm sorry," he managed to spit out between gritted teeth. "But you can't expect me to just do a complete one-eighty because things have gotten a little weird."

She cocked an eyebrow and shot him an incredulous look.

"Okay," he conceded. "Because things have gotten about five steps beyond bat-shit insane. Seriously, though, Casey. We've been yelling at each other this whole time, since we got through the door. And all of a sudden, you decide to get offended? Pull your punches, why don'tcha?"

"I..." She worried at her bottom lip with her teeth, and he wondered what it was she wanted to say that had her so twisted up. "I'm sorry, Derek," she finally said, voice still tight with restrained anger. "I just... I just wish something could be easy."

After a moment, he shrugged. "Dying would be pretty easy, but I'm not really up for that."

With a bitter chuckle, she wiped at her eyes and jerked her head in a brief nod. "Me either. So we go in carefully?"

A retort about her hysterics not making much of an impact on their original plan danced on the tip of his tongue, but one look at her expression changed his mind and he just nodded. It was going to be a while before she was going to forgive him for... whatever it was had just happened.

She'd never know the concessions he made for her.

* * *

The town wasn't so much a town as it was a complete and total dump. He didn't get into this stupid fantasy stuff like Casey did, but when he thought about magical cities or whatever, he pictured cobblestones and narrow streets and that sort of thing.

This place was a handful of thatched-roof cottages and a bunch of muddy ditches that were probably intended to be streets. And there were goats all over the place. Well, they probably weren't _goats_, exactly, but whatever the equivalent was over on this side of the door. Whatever they were, they smelled funny.

"Oh, yeah," he muttered sarcastically to himself, "I can tell this place is gonna be _great_."

"So..." Casey drawled, either ignoring what he said or unaware that he'd even spoken at all. "This is the town he was talking about."

He just shook his head. "There's supposed to be a wizard running around here someplace," he said in a flat sort of voice.

"This can't be all there is to it," she said, striding forward with determination as if he hadn't said anything at all. "This is probably, like, where the poor people live or something."

Sighing, Derek followed, keeping his mouth firmly shut and doing his best to avoid stepping in what looked like piles of mud but probably had more to do with the goats milling around.

Somewhere ahead, there was an unmistakable squelching sound. "Oh, _yuck_," Casey said with conviction, shaking her foot in the air. "That's just..."

"Yeah, Weird Guy sure knew what he was talking about when he sent us _here_," he couldn't help saying.

She shot him a glare over her shoulder. "Derek, don't." So she _could_ hear him, then.

Because he was making an effort to be nice, he just frowned. "At least it doesn't smell _too_ awful," he eventually offered.

"Not helping," she retorted sharply, resuming her pace.

As he lagged behind, it occurred to him that not even half a day ago, he was risking his life to save her from that big, scary guy. And now, she was obviously so mad at him that she was slipping around in piles of goat shit to avoid him. All because he happened to do exactly what he always did. Just at a time when she apparently wasn't in the mood to listen to constructive criticism.

It wasn't fair. It really wasn't.

If they met up with another one of those knights in town and he wanted to take Casey to do... whatever, Derek had half a mind to just let her get kidnapped. It wasn't worth getting humiliated and injured to help out someone who clearly didn't want him to hang around. In fact, he ought to just stop letting her boss him around and find his way back to that stupid door. It didn't look all _that_ hard to open.

He snorted to himself. Who was he kidding?

"Hey, Case," he called, shaking his head -- he was _such_ a freaking idiot, letting her get away with this kind of stuff. "Wait up!"

* * *

After a little while, it got better. Casey was still pissed as hell -- when he turned his head, he kept catching her scowling at him -- but at least the village or whatever started looking less like a complete hole.

Cottages gave way to buildings, and if the road was still basically a dirt track, it wasn't as overrun with livestock. The number of people they saw was getting bigger, too, and they were all heading in the same direction.

"Do you..." he began in a quiet, neutral voice. "Do you think maybe we ought to see where everyone is going? Just in case, I mean."

For a long while, she didn't say anything, and he figured she was still playing the 'Ignore Derek' game. And then, "What about keeping a low profile?"

He did his best to overlook the snide undertone. "If that's where everyone's supposed to be, wouldn't it be high-profile not to be there?"

She sniffed, but he noticed that as they walked, they were drifting more and more in the direction that all the others were going.

And then they hit the mob.

Well... maybe not _really_ a mob, but it was the biggest group of people Derek had ever seen that wasn't standing in front of a stage screaming for the band to come back out and play another set. And they all _smelled_. He and Casey got sucked into the crowd, and he could feel himself being swept away in the throng.

A strong hand clamped around his wrist.

Glancing down, he saw that it was Casey's. "We have to stick together," she muttered dully. "And remember what the old man said."

Right. No talking. Especially now that he knew that people around here had a tendency to point sharp things at strangers.

As they got pushed along, he caught glimpses of market stalls every now and again. At least, he _thought_ that's what they were. Whatever they were, though, they were on the edge of the mass of people and therefore a good place to be. With his mind made up, Derek started actively moving toward one stand in particular, Casey in tow.

"Derek, what..." she whispered.

"No English, remember?" he hissed. "Just trust me, Case."

Her nails dug furiously into his skin and he came perilously close to swearing out loud. Instead, he just gave her arm a good yank and smirked when she stumbled. But she regained her balance easily enough, and after she was done glaring at him, they kept moving through the crowd.

It was touch and go for a bit, especially when the fattest man Derek had ever seen in his entire life walked right in front of them and wouldn't get out of the way for anything in the world. He was seriously considering whether or not anything too terrible would happen if he kicked the guy, but the man abruptly stepped aside, and then they were... out.

"That was the worst idea _ever_," she said in a soft, livid voice once it was obvious that no one was paying any attention to them.

"Oh, excuse me," he retorted, equally quietly, "did you _want_ to get trampled to death by, like, a million fantasy people? Be my guest, Spacey."

She rolled her eyes. "Typical Derek. Just does whatever the hell he wants, and the rest of us get dragged along for the ride. I swear, sometimes I just want to... oh, my _God_," she moaned.

He blinked. That sounded... really out of place. Kind of... erotic, actually. "What?" he asked blankly, trying to stop thinking about the look of ecstasy that was on her face right now.

"Do you _smell_ that?"

"I smell feet," he said. "And, uh, those goat-things. I don't think that's what you mean, though."

At least, he hoped that wasn't what she meant. If feet and goats produced _that_ look in her eyes, he was prepared to be _very_ freaked out.

"I think it's coming from over there," she said dreamily, taking several steps toward a nearby cart. "It smells like..."

A few feet away from the stand, and his nostrils were full of it, too. And she was _right_. "Real food," he groaned. "Christ, I'm starving..."

She wrinkled her nose. "We don't have any money."

"Maybe they don't do money here," he said hopefully. "They could be on, like, a barter system or something."

Her arched eyebrows were obviously expressing her disbelief that he even knew what a barter system was, but he was prepared to ignore it if she somehow got them fed. "What could we even trade?"

Automatically, his hands started to dig around in his pockets. "Well... I've got a quarter, an American nickel, and a rock from the river that I thought looked pretty neat. What about you?"

"We're going to starve," she said with a sigh.

"_That's_ the spirit, Case." He gave her a nudge in the ribs with his elbow.

Grimacing, she flapped a hand at him in a half-hearted sort of way. "Seriously, Derek," she said. "The only thing that could even come close to getting us food is trying to trade the dagger that man gave me, but even if I knew how to haggle, I wouldn't dare give it up. We might need it."

He came really close to agreeing with her, but the smell of whatever-it-was baking was just too good to pass up. "So we get some money," he told her. "No big deal."

"It's not like you can just go and bug Edwin until he gives you forty bucks to go away," she said, giving him an incredulous look. "Are you suggesting that we hit some old lady over the head and steal her purse?"

"Because _that_ is a totally sensible and well-thought-out plan," he said sarcastically. "You really think I'm horrible, don't you, Casey?"

"I never said that," she replied defensively.

With a little sigh, he decided not to push the point. "What I meant was that we're in a market thingy, right? There's got to be _some_ way to make some quick cash."

"So you're the expert on this sort of thing, huh? Just how many outdoor markets have you been to?" she asked, the derisive note in her voice completely unnecessary.

He grinned. "None. Which is exactly how many you've been to, princess, so shut up and help me look."

* * *

"No," Casey said firmly. "Absolutely not. I _forbid_ it!"

"Who died and made you my mom?" he asked, glaring at her. "We've been all over this damn place, and this looks like our only option. And if the size of the bag that man keeps shaking in the air is any indication, when I win, we'll be able to buy a whole freaking cart of cookies or whatever they're baking back there."

She saw his glare and raised him one angrily stamped foot. "How do I even _begin_ telling you about all the things wrong with what you just said? Number one, they don't seem to make cookies here--"

"Yet another detail to support my hypothesis that we are, in fact, in hell," he interrupted.

"_Number two_," she continued pointedly, "you've never won a physical fight in your life, so why do you think you'd have even a snowball's chance? And last but not least, number three, why do you just automatically assume _you'd_ be the one fighting?"

He couldn't help it. He really couldn't. "Um, you're a girl?" he replied, lips twitching.

It was totally worth it -- her face turned red and her eyes practically bugged out of her head. "That's beside the point!" she all but shrieked. "Just because I happen to have breasts doesn't make me completely physically useless. I am perfectly capable of--"

"Yeah, I know," he said, cutting off her tirade mostly because he was pretty sure he couldn't stand to hear her say the word 'breasts' again. Ever. "I was there when you saved my life and shot that guy. Remember?"

_That_ shut her up quick.

"But we've been watching the ring for, like, _ever_, and I haven't seen a chick step in yet," he said in what he was hoping was a fairly reasonable tone. "Low-profile, right?"

"Because fighting for money is _really_ staying under the radar," she muttered.

With a lopsided smile, he indicated the large crowd surrounding the ring. "Around here, I think it is," he said. "_Everyone's_ doing it. So, we agree, yeah? I'm in."

"Don't expect me to mourn your corpse when you get beaten to death," she said with a scowl.

Impulsively, he threw an arm around her shoulders and squeezed. "Your concern for my welfare is touching, Casey."

As he turned to head toward the man who seemed like he was in charge, he felt a hand grab at his shirt and tug. "Derek!"

"Yeah?" He looked back and saw worry in Casey's eyes.

"Just... just be careful, okay?" she said, cheeks pink and expression unreadable. "I can't... don't get yourself killed, Derek. _Really_."

He wasn't sure what to do when she looked at him like that, so he just reached out and tapped her nose. "I won't," he said with way more confidence than he felt. "I promise."

She stayed silent, but the look on her face was screaming, _You'd better_.

Walking up toward the man on the podium -- and, more to the point, away from Casey -- he finally gave in to the fear and let his hands shake. By the time his foot touched the first step, it was shaking too. He barely made it up the stairs.

The man took one look at him, laughed, and shoved a paper under his nose. He couldn't even figure out the _alphabet_ it was written in, much less what it said, but once the man poked him with something resembling a pen, Derek took it and scrawled a random symbol at the bottom of the page.

Clapping a meaty hand on his shoulder, the man said something he didn't understand and pointed at his belt. _That_ one, he got.

He unslung his sword and passed it over. For a second, he wondered if maybe he shouldn't've left it with Casey, but if he died, she probably wouldn't need it anyway. Hell, if she was right, his death would trap her here forever. She'd have to... well, whatever. Learn the language, marry a weirdo with a sword, and live in a smelly hut raising goats and fantasy-land brats for the rest of her life.

The clattering noise his sword made as the man threw it on a pile of similar weapons jerked him back to reality, and before he could so much as twitch, hands were on his shoulders and he found himself standing in the middle of the fighting ring.

This was a bad idea.

He'd had some pretty awful ones in the past, but they didn't even begin to compare. _Twelve out of ten for stupidity, Der_, something in the back of his head muttered.

And then his opponent stepped into the ring and he came really close to losing bladder control.

This was a _really_ bad idea.

_Did I say twelve out of ten? Because I meant twelve_ million _out of ten, you idiot! _

The guy was, like, a wall of muscle. Derek would have sworn he was looking at a cartoon strongman, except that the cartoon was totally real and reaching out to grab at his neck.

But he hadn't spent three-quarters of his life being the scrappy little guy on the hockey team for nothing -- he ducked the grasping hands and scurried to the other side of the ring, trying desperately to come up with a plan.

Plan, nothing. He blinked and Muscle Dude was towering over him with a malevolent grin.

"Uh... I'm sure we can work this out peaceably," he squeaked. His mouth obviously hadn't caught up with what his brain was yelling at him -- Muscle Dude didn't understand a damn word he was saying. "How about we--"

A fist the size of a Christmas ham landed in his gut and it took everything he had not to fall to the ground.

"Hey, buddy..." Derek wheezed. "You don't have to..."

Another fist connected with his injured cheek and the world behind his closed eyes flashed white for a second. As he fell to his knees, he was pretty sure he heard Casey screaming his name. She sounded kind of hysterical. Like really seriously freaking out.

Coughing, he brought his hand gently to his face. His fingers came away red with blood and he stared at them in confusion.

A loud roar snapped him back to attention. Muscle Dude was trying to murder him. Right.

Derek staggered back to his feet amidst scattered applause and loud booing. If he managed to survive this, he was never going to watch pro wrestling again.

But the man was charging at him. This time, he was a little more prepared and side-stepped at the very last second -- Muscle Dude crashed right into the wall and the audience howled.

Shaking his head, Muscle Dude glared at him and lunged, wrapping his arms around him and basically doing his best to squeeze Derek to death. Derek kicked and punched as best as he could, but it was kind of like trying to attack and defeat a brick wall.

He kept twisting and squirming, though, and after what felt like five eternities, he'd wiggled out of his grip and somehow managed to land on Muscle Dude's back. Desperately, he clutched at the man's neck for dear life, grabbing at the patch of skin where neck met shoulder. Muscle Dude kept shouting and shaking, but Derek just dug in all the harder.

It was totally unexpected, then, when the guy suddenly stopped shouting and dropped to the ground.

As Derek rolled clear, he cracked his head against a rock and saw stars. But he dragged himself to his feet and stared down in awe. Muscle Dude was completely, a hundred percent unconscious.

The crowd was silent.

He looked around the ring, grinning like the idiot that his subconscious was still screaming he was, and saw nothing but stunned faces.

After a long pause, the official guy in charge of the fights came into the ring, prodded Muscle Dude with a foot and nodded grimly at Derek. Apparently, that was it.

The crowd went wild, but there was something... _wrong_ about it. It didn't really feel like cheering. But then again, he was bleeding from a couple head wounds, it kind of hurt to breathe, and every time he blinked, the whole world turned a somersault, so he probably wasn't in any shape to be making psychological judgements.

And then he was in a steel vise somehow.

Muzzily, he looked down and saw that Casey had flung herself over the barrier and was now hugging him with every ounce of strength she had. Her face was pale and stained with tears, and the only thing she was saying was his name, over and over and over.

He smiled goofily at her. "I _won_," he announced in a proud voice. "You're not allowed to be mad at me any more."

"Oh, my God, Derek," she whispered against the fabric of his shirt.

"First thing, I'm gonna buy a new pair of pants with our money," he said. "Do you think they sell pants here? Maybe a shirt, too."

She laughed, but it was way closer to a sob. "We'll get as many pairs of pants as you want."

"Hey, Casey?"

Her arms loosened slightly, and he realized that she was basically holding him up. "Yeah?"

"How the hell did I win?" he asked blankly.

"Well..." Her hand went up to his cheek -- it took him a second to realize that she was attempting to clean the blood off his face. "You want the truth?"

It really _was_ kind of hard to breathe; pain spiked down through his ribs whenever he tried to inhale. "Unless it involves someone else shooting him in the ass with an arrow and depriving me of my hard-earned victory, yes."

She smiled, but it was thin. "From where I was standing, it sort of looked like you did a Vulcan neck pinch on him."

"A Vulcan neck pinch?" he echoed, coughing. "Seriously?"

With a nod, she resumed her efforts to clean him up.

"That's the most awesome thing ever," he breathed.

And that's when he passed out.

* * *

Three hours, new outfits for both of them, and a room rented at the inn later, and Casey was obviously attempting to murder him. If she came at him with that damn spoon one more time, he was going to... well, he hadn't worked it all out yet, but it was going to be painful for _someone_.

"I can feed myself," he said angrily, pushing the spoon away. "Besides, I'm not hungry any more."

"You need to eat," she replied in a soothing voice that made him want to throw something at her. "You're hurt, and you threw up twice on the way here."

"My head hurts," he complained. "And I'm tired. I need sleep way more than I need food."

"Since you're vomiting," she said, rolling her eyes at him, "you're probably concussed. Sleep is the last thing you need. I paid the guy at the bar for a couple of baths, though."

The world was kind of fuzzy. Maybe she was right about the broken head thing -- he hit the ground pretty hard when he fell. "I'm glad you got the man to give me my money and my sword," he said out of nowhere. "Even though you're probably still mad at me from before. That was nice of you, you know?"

"Wow... you really _are_ messed up," she said with a little snort of laughter. "Yeah, that guy was mean, wasn't he?"

He smiled up at her. "Bet a lot of people lost money on that fight. But I won fair and square."

"Derek, you need to promise me you won't try to do that again. That's twice now that you've almost gotten killed for stuff that isn't important enough for you to die over," she told him seriously, looking away and keeping herself busy by cleaning up the table full of food.

"But, Casey, I won us money," he said, confused at her attitude. He'd just done a _good_ thing, right? "We've got supper, and a bed to sleep in, and we can finally wash off the river stench."

She spun around and she had tears in her eyes. "None of that is worth your life, you moron," she said.

"Oh, God," he moaned. "No crying. If I promise not to put myself in mortal peril, _you_ have to promise to stop crying all the time. I can't stand it."

Sniffling, she offered him a watery smile. "It's not that I don't appreciate it, Derek. I'd just appreciate you not dying a lot more."

"Aw, you're just saying that because you think if I die, you'd get stuck on this side of the door," he teased.

"Which is why you need to finish eating and get some rest," she said, clearing her throat and looking a lot more... in charge. "Tomorrow, we need to go looking for the mage that guy told us about. The sooner we can get to the Island of Fire and out of this horrible place, the better. If nothing, _you_ need to see a doctor."

He frowned. "I'm _not_ hungry."

"If you don't eat, you won't get to take a bath," she replied evenly, glaring down her nose at him. "I'll tell the inn-people to dump it out instead."

Mouth falling open, he gave her the dirtiest look he could muster. "You suck."

* * *

"This is stupid," he shouted at the door. "I won't do it."

"Then let me back in," she shouted from the other side. "I _have_ to know that you're awake. Either you do this, or I stay in the room to watch."

Okay, so he wasn't going to win this one. Shucking off his filthy clothes -- he fully planned on burning them in the fireplace -- he stepped into the tub, grabbed the soap, and started scrubbing.

"The itsy bitsy spider," he sang at the top of his lungs, "went up the waterspout... are you happy, Casey? I _told_ you I couldn't sing."

Her voice was muffled by the door, but he could still detect a tinge of sadistic glee. "I'm delighted," she said. "Keep it up, Pavarotti."

"...down came the rain and washed the spider out..."

* * *

It took three refills and rescrubs to feel clean. Wearing his weird new clothes, Derek took his turn in the hallway while Casey commandeered the tub.

"Why are your boxers hanging on the fireplace screen?" she shouted through the door.

"Couldn't figure out what the stuff here looked like, so I just washed mine out in the tub," he called back. "Besides, you can't go wrong with Superman."

"Ew."

"Hey, _you're_ the one who asked," he said defensively. "So, does this bath beat your last attempt?"

Silence.

"I mean, it's got to be _warmer_ at the very least," he said, grinning to himself.

"I hate you, Derek."

* * *

"Wait... what are you doing?" he asked quickly.

Glancing up, she gave him a confused look. Her wet hair sent water droplets flying everywhere. "Going through your pockets? If we're going to get rid of these clothes, we shouldn't..."

She'd found it.

His eyes slid closed and he almost -- _almost_ -- let out a whimper of distress.

"Derek..." she said sternly.

"Yeah?" he whispered.

He was _so_ dead.

"You have a book of matches in your pocket. And you didn't tell me."

"Uh-huh," he said carefully. "Grabbed them from that restaurant we stopped at right before we got to the summer house."

Gut twisting, he finally forced himself to open his eyes. If Casey could glare literal daggers at him, she'd be doing it right now. "You've had matches this whole time and you didn't tell me? _This_ is how you've been starting your magic fires? With _matches_?" her voice went up a whole octave and he winced.

"Um... surprise?" he tried, knowing it was lame.

She threw the matches at his chest. "As soon as you get better, I'm killing you."

* * *

He was having such a nice dream. He was back at home, in his bed, and he was hugging a warm, soft pillow. But _someone_ had to go and ruin it by making a really loud slamming noise.

"Casey?" he muttered. "I know you said you couldn't let me sleep more than an hour at a time, but damn it, do you have to throw shit?"

Somewhere from the other side of the bed, she let out a sleepy grunt and burrowed deeper into her own pillow.

He did dimly remember her informing him that his little stunt with the matches meant that they were sharing the bed in spite of his injured state. And they were doing okay so far. At least, neither one of them had wound up on the floor yet, even though she'd slopped her cold, wet hair all over him and he had to keep a death-grip on his half of the blankets if he didn't want her stealing them. But this latest...

Wait.

His brain caught up with the fact that Casey couldn't have woken him up if she was asleep herself right around the same time that big hands wrapped around his arms and legs and jerked him out of the bed.

A stifled scream in his left ear let him know that they were doing the same thing to Casey.

Whatever happened next was obscured by the fact that someone tied a cloth around his eyes. The person doing the blindfolding hissed something in his ear that couldn't have been too friendly, though, because they followed up by spitting on him for good measure.

"Derek..." he heard Casey cry, far off.

"Shut up, Case," he replied, trying not to panic. "No English, remember?"

So he stayed quiet as they tied up his hands and feet and lifted him in the air. He didn't say a word until the big hands dumped him on a stone floor and he heard metal grind against metal.

"Casey?" he whispered. "Casey, are you there?"

"I'm here," came the soft reply. "Derek, are you okay?"

"Not dead. Did they tie you up, too? Did you get a look at them?" he asked, his ribs finally waking up and realizing that they were hurting _really_ bad.

Something rasped and her hands were on his arms, working at the ropes. "They covered my eyes," she said. "They didn't do anything else, though."

As soon as she'd untied his hands, they went straight to his eyes and removed the blindfold. Blearily, he looked around the room, letting Casey work at the ropes on his feet without protest. Stone floor, stone walls, two windows so high up he could barely make them out in the faint moonlight, and a huge wooden door with metal bars in the tiny opening.

"Casey..." he breathed, his voice only shaking a _little_.

"I think we're in prison," she said matter-of-factly.

He couldn't think of anything to say to that, but he looked down and saw that his hand was clutching at hers in a white-knuckled grip.

* * *


	7. And Met a Man Wearing a Hat

A/N: These long chapters are probably going to continue, just FYI. Thanks for reading!

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Seven: And Met a Man Wearing a Hat

It took less than half a day for Casey to decide that jail was a pretty crappy place to be. Especially with an injured Derek, who spent so much time whining about how much his ribs hurt that she longed to knock him over the head again just so he'd shut up.

And then she felt guilty, because he _was_ in pain, and he'd done it to himself for her. Not just for her, of course, but enough that she felt responsible.

They didn't sleep at all. After she'd untied him, Casey propped herself up against the wall and let Derek rest his head against her leg -- it wasn't a feather pillow, but it had to be better than the stone floor. They watched the light brighten from night to dawn in silence.

Just after the suns rose, a stone-faced man brought them a bucket of water. Rising with a snarl, Derek had attempted to hit the man, but she held him back. Whatever trouble they were in, attacking their jailer would only make it worse.

"Maybe they don't like my shoes," Derek said pensively.

She hummed. "They _are_ pretty gross. Why didn't you buy new ones?"

They'd been playing this game ever since the water arrived -- guessing why they were in prison. It was mostly an effort to keep their minds off the fact that no food had accompanied the water. At least, it was for Casey; she had no idea why Derek was continuing to play along.

"I didn't see any hard-soled shoes," he said. "I don't know how much walking we're going to wind up doing."

With a morose sigh, she waved a hand toward the barred door. "Not much, probably." And it was her turn. "Maybe someone saw you before we found the market, while you were waving that stupid sword around, and decided that you were a danger to society."

He tilted his head upward so she could see the irritated face he was making. "And in that case, you're here why?"

"Who's more foolish -- the fool or the fool who follows him?" she said lightly.

"No fair," he replied, chuckling and wincing at the same time. "You're not allowed to make _Star Wars_ jokes when it hurts too much to laugh at them. Although since you brought it up, what happened to my sword?"

"It _was_ at the inn," she said. "I put all that stuff in a cabinet in our room. It's probably still there."

His expression darkened abruptly, then brightened almost as quickly. "Or they've taken it. Maybe women aren't allowed to carry weapons here."

"That's got the same problem as mine did," she said mildly. "If that's it, then why are _you_ here?"

"Well, _duh_," he said with a suspicious grin, "I must be the one who gave you the weapons! A dumb old girl wouldn't have gotten the idea on her own."

"De-rek," she replied, rolling her eyes. "You're a chauvinistic pig, you know?"

"Oink, oink," he agreed solemnly.

They were silent for a while. Casey's stomach rumbled and she tried her best to ignore it. Derek had to have heard it, but he didn't say anything.

After a while, he shifted his head restlessly on her leg. "Are you okay?" she asked in a rush.

"I'd murder someone for a Tylenol," he admitted. "But that's a dangerous road to go down; I might end up in _jail_ for doing something like that."

Her lips twitched. And then something horrible occurred to her. "Derek, do you think maybe that guy died?" she asked him as carefully as she could manage.

"What guy?" he replied blankly.

"The... the one you fought," she said. "When we left, he was still unconscious. Maybe that's why..."

"Hey, when we left, _I_ was still unconscious," he said, but his expression was grave. "Shit, Casey, do you really think...?"

With a shrug, she tried to find someplace to put her suddenly fidgety hands. Her new clothes didn't have any pockets, and everything about Derek's body language was currently screaming, _Don't touch me!_ "That's probably not it," she said, trying and failing to keep her voice from shaking. "We're just being stupid about all this."

"Yeah," he said, clearly unconvinced. "Right."

Tentatively, one of her hands came to rest on his hair. It was unexpectedly clean and soft against her fingers, and she had to force herself to remember that they'd gotten to bathe just last night. It felt like years ago.

"Everything will be all right," she said. "What is it you said about this kind of thing not happening to Venturis? I bet that applies to McDonalds too."

"So all of a sudden you think I'm _right_ about stuff?" he asked snidely, and everything in her wanted to let his head drop to the stones and yell at him.

Instead, she forced her hand to smooth through his hair again. "When it's convenient," she said, lips twitching. "Don't read any more into it, though."

His eyes slid shut, and she felt him relax slightly under her touch. "Well, _that's_ a relief. With all of the 'don't let yourself get hurt, Derek' and the 'are you okay, Derek' you've been spouting off lately, I was starting to think you'd developed a soft spot for me. Good to know things are back to normal."

"Well... as normal as they _can_ be," she replied wryly. "Given the circumstances."

"Hey, maybe that's it," he said, not opening his eyes. "Maybe they arrested us for being too normal." Turning, he nestled into her a bit and she realized that he was dozing off.

"Sure, Derek," she muttered as his breathing slowed, "sounds good to me."

* * *

Night came and went twice, and their water bucket was refilled four more times before they saw anyone else. But the 'anyone else' that came by was pretty impressive, so maybe it just took everyone a while to get stuff sorted out.

Derek's head was in her lap again, and Casey had actually managed to drift off to sleep when the door slammed open. For a horrifying second, she thought it was a gunshot. Which sent her leaping to her feet, tossing Derek to the floor.

"God damn it, Casey," he said muzzily. "What the hell--"

"Is such inappropriate address common for you, young man?" the 'anyone else' asked neutrally.

And their mouths fell open.

It was a man, not all _that_ much older than either of them, if Casey was any judge. He was wrapped in swirling multi-colored robes and had a very ornate hat perched on his head. Spectacles slipped down his nose and he shoved them back into place in a gesture just frustrated enough to suggest to her that he did it often.

"Dude, you speak English!" Derek said happily from his place on the ground.

She nudged him un-gently with her foot. "No, you moron! He's got to be the wizard that Smelly Guy told us about. Look at his hat!"

"We generally prefer the term 'mage,'" the man said. "Anyone can be a decent hedge-wizard if he can tell one herb from another, but mages must actually possess the touch of magic."

"How very interesting," Derek replied sweetly, picking himself up and making a show of dusting off his clothes. "What a fascinating insight into your culture." His voice abruptly sharpened. "Now, what the hell are you doing here?"

The mage blinked, obviously offended.

But Casey was right there with Derek -- she'd been locked up just as long as he had been, after all. "Maybe not the most polite delivery, but I have to say, Mister Mage-Person, I'm kinda wondering the same thing as my... friend," she said as civilly as she could manage.

"So we're _friends_ now?" Derek asked under his breath in a bemused sort of voice.

"Shut up," she hissed, elbowing him.

The mage tilted his head and stared at both of them. After a long moment, he turned to speak with someone outside the cell. "Are you absolutely _certain_?" he asked.

The reply was muffled but clearly in a different language.

Jerking his head in a short nod that made his hat wobble slightly, the mage turned back to them. "The ringmaster says you defeated his finest fighter, boy," he said.

"Yeah, _so_?" Derek shot back. "What's that got to do with you?"

"I am meant to determine exactly what spell you used to do so," he replied. "The ringmaster believes -- and I concur -- that a weakling could not have defeated a master fighter so easily without the use of magic."

"And so what if I did?" he asked cockily. "And I'm not a weakling, magic dude. I'll have you know that I'm a nationally ranked hockey player. Two championships and--"

Casey nudged him and he cut off his tirade with a small gasp of pain. She would have felt guiltier if she wasn't beginning to suspect that Derek had gotten them both thrown in prison for being stupid.

With a raised eyebrow, the mage frowned. "To use magic to win any contest of skill is a punishable offense, young man. But you must tell me first from whence you hail -- your speech is unlike any I've ever heard."

Derek blinked in confusion.

Sighing, she decided it was time to intervene. Mostly because Derek had already gotten them arrested, and she was worried that he was well on his way to getting them the death penalty. "We're strangers," she replied. "We fell through the Door, and some weird old guy told us to come here and find you. If we don't find Fire Island, we can't go back home. Oh, and Derek didn't use magic to beat that guy; neither of us know anything about magic. He just hit a pressure point or something."

Something behind the mage's eyes flared. "Pressure point?" he echoed as if he'd never heard those two words put together in that way before.

"Sure," she said with a shrug. "Places on the body that are extra sensitive."

"Like when you hit your arm just right and the whole thing goes numb," Derek interjected with what he probably thought was a helpful smile.

"You are an anatomist?" he asked, staring at Derek.

"Nope," he said with a cheerful shrug, "just really, really lucky. If it's any help, I think I got hurt bad enough that I'm gonna start coughing up blood any day now."

Tilting his head, the mage studied Derek carefully. "Your injuries are grave," he agreed after a long pause. "And they are aggravated by your current living conditions."

He snorted and shook his head. "If you're saying that being in jail makes me hurt worse, I can't disagree with you there."

The mage turned back to Casey. "Your friend does not know any spells?" he asked, staring hard at her. She got the feeling that he wasn't asking the questions he _really_ wanted to, but she was pretty sure it would be a bad idea to bring it up.

"None," she confirmed with a nod. "Just dumb luck. We needed some money and that was the only way we could figure out to get it without robbing someone."

"As much as I resent the 'dumb luck' thing," Derek said, "that about covers it."

"I must speak with the master of the prison," he said. "You will excuse me."

And he was gone.

"So... was what just happened a good thing?" Derek asked slowly.

She had no answer.

* * *

The chair had a _cushion_. She hadn't even been in the same room as a chair with a cushion in almost a month.

"Dibs," Derek said shortly, limping toward the chair.

"No way, gimp," she shot back as she leapt forward and sank down into the seat.

It was just as glorious as she'd hoped. Muscles in her back that she hadn't even known were tense relaxed.

"You're evil," he said with a pout. "Depriving a poor, _disabled_ boy of the only chair in the room."

She rolled her eyes. "No, just observant. And you walked over here just fine, you know. Not much of a disability, Derek."

With a grimace, he made a show of clutching at his head. "I was putting up a brave front. And what the hell are you observing that keeps me from sitting down, huh?"

"She is quite possibly referring to the fact that you are in immediate need of healing, young man," the mage said, entering the room briskly. "I cannot complete an examination if you are sitting down."

He obviously couldn't hide the twitch of surprise and Casey grinned broadly. "You know," he told the mage with a glower, "you can't be that much older than I am, so what's with all the 'young man' stuff?"

"The magic slows the aging process," he replied. "I will say that I am old enough to be your father several times over and leave it at that."

She should have expected something like that. She'd read her share of fantasy books, after all.

"Like Dumbledore?" Derek asked. "From _Harry Potter_? That dude was, like, two hundred years old when Snape axed him."

Her mouth dropped open.

He shot her a dirty look from across the room. "Hey, I _read_," he said defensively. "Sometimes. Quit looking at me like I just crawled out from under a rock."

"I have no idea what any of that means," the mage said. "But you need to take off your shirt so I can assess your injuries more accurately."

"No way." Derek folded his arms over his chest. "You may have gotten us out of jail, but I have no real reason to believe you aren't some evil wizard who's going to try to... seduce us or something."

Clearing her throat to get his attention, she rolled her eyes at him. "Do you even listen to the stupid stuff you're saying?"

"What? We both know I'm _way_ hotter than you, princess," he said, sticking his tongue out at her for good measure.

The mage stared back and forth between them. "Princess?" he exclaimed, sounding horrified. "And you address her like _that_?"

Derek grinned at the mistake, but Casey was too put out by the 'hotter' comment to do much more than sniff. "Figure of speech, dude. Casey is about as royal as my toenail clippings. Less, probably."

And that was about all she could take of _that_. "Look," she said, voice grating in irritation, "I know you sacrificed yourself to buy us a hot meal or whatever, but could you _stop_ randomly insulting me in front of a perfect stranger?"

"It is rather unseemly," the mage agreed in a tone that suggested he was enjoying it all the same. "Not to mention the fact that you still have not done as I requested."

She huffed. "Derek, just take off your damn shirt. If he has his wicked way with you, then you'll at least get the satisfaction of knowing you're more sexually appealing than I am."

"Yeah, well, better not let yourself get distracted by all the sexy man-skin, Case," he said, stripping off his shirt and throwing it over in a corner. "Examine away, Magic Man."

Suppressing a sigh, she let her eyes slide closed. She knew he had a habit of saying particularly idiotic things when he was nervous, but _honestly_. The guy just rescued them from a freaking dungeon -- did Derek really think he could be that evil?

There was a sharp intake of breath and then, "Broken ribs," she heard the mage say in a satisfied sort of voice. "At least two of them. You're lucky you're still breathing, boy."

"You can tell all that from a magic spell?" Derek asked.

"No," he replied. "But the only reason that such a light touch to the side would cause you that much pain is if your ribs were in fairly bad shape. And if they're that badly damaged, you should have punctured your lung and suffocated to death by now."

"Like I said before -- dumb luck," she murmured, not bothering to open her eyes.

"_Hey_!" Derek cried loudly. "I heard that."

"It would have been wasted if you hadn't," she said lazily.

Someone cleared his throat and she guessed that it was probably the wizard; Derek wouldn't have been nearly so polite. "Hold still."

"Hey... wait, what are you -- _ow_!" Derek shouted. "What did you just do to me?"

She finally looked over at the pair. Derek had a red mark that sort of looked like a burn running down his side, and he had folded his arms and was glaring at the mage, who had a decidedly smug look on his face. "_That_ was the magic spell," he said.

"It feels like you just set me on fire," he snarled, curling further into his defensive pose. "And my ribs..."

The smug look deepened into an outright smirk. "Yes?"

"Okay, so maybe it doesn't hurt so much to breathe," he admitted grudgingly. "And I can twist around without feeling like someone's banging rocks on my bones from the inside."

Staring at the red mark with renewed understanding, she felt sort of awed. "You _fixed_ him?" she asked the mage wonderingly. "It should take, like, eight weeks to heal from that sort of thing."

"You will still feel somewhat sore," the mage said, bending down and handing him his shirt. "I cannot completely heal you, after all."

"Oh, of course," Derek said faintly. She watched him turn and twist and even bend down to touch his toes, amazement written all over his face. "You should figure out a way to bottle that stuff and sell it."

The mage smiled. "Intent plays a role, which would make such a process difficult if not impossible. But I am glad you are feeling better, young man. Now, we can talk further about what you two said back at the prison."

Casey blinked and sat up straight in her chair. Time to pay attention. "What did you want to talk about?" she asked carefully.

"You said that you came from beyond the Door," he said flatly, in a tone that indicated disbelief. "The Door has not been opened since before my master's time, if it ever existed at all. It is legend."

"Well, that old guy got really mad at us when we told him where we came from," Derek said thoughtfully. "Basically, he said that we weren't smart enough to figure out how to open it."

"Most scholars believe that the Door is a metaphor," the mage said, tilting his head at him. "A level of meditation."

Derek snorted. "If by 'level of meditation,' you mean a big freaking piece of wood with hinges that opens and closes and is guarded by a man with the most disgusting feet in all of creation, then sure. Why not?"

"We couldn't get it back open once we fell through," Casey offered, feeling a little left out of the conversation. "I think it works differently in our world than it does here, based on what the old man said."

The mage shook his head. "Are you telling me that you two met the Keeper?"

"He yelled at us for more than a week, gave us weird-ass weapons, and then told us to come and talk to you," Derek said. "He also made the worst soup I've ever tasted in my whole life. Worse than Marti's Mud and Bug Surprise."

She couldn't suppress the laugh. "You actually _ate_ that stuff when Marti shoved it at you?"

With a self-deprecating headshake, he grinned. "She's a very insistent nine-year-old."

"Oh, I know," she replied, "remember who had to spend six months playing Beauty Shop with her?"

His grin widened. "I still have the pictures on my computer, Clown-Face Casey."

"De-rek," she retorted lightly. She and Derek continued to grin dumbly at each other from across the room, and only a little part of her wondered why.

The mage was frowning, glancing back and forth between them. "It is _too_ extraordinary. Even if the Door and the Keeper did exist, they would not make themselves known to crass children like _you_."

She didn't know what to say to an insult like that, but Derek visibly stiffened. "You want proof, Magic Man? Let us go back to the inn and get our weapons."

"No," he said, shaking his head. "I promised the bailiff that I would ascertain what sort of danger you presented and deal with you accordingly. If I let you two leave, what's to keep you from never returning?"

Casey blew out a frustrated sigh. "How about the fact that we were _sent_ to talk to you?" she asked impatiently. "You're, like, the only one who can help us get home, apparently."

And the mage rounded on her. She didn't like his expression; it reminded her too much of what he looked like in the prison, when he kept asking questions he already knew the answers to. "The girl stays," he said sharply. "You may go to the inn to fetch your belongings, and I'll keep the girl here to ensure your return."

"I thought you said we could _trust_ him, Case," Derek said mockingly.

She frowned, reassessing the situation. "All I said was that he probably didn't spring us from prison to sexually molest us."

"We should stick together," he told her in a firm voice. "That's what we decided -- you and me, right? If you don't go, I don't go."

It only took her a few seconds to make up her mind. She climbed out of her chair and walked over to him, putting a hand on his arm. "Go on, Derek," she said quietly. "You won't be gone long, and I'll be fine."

"But--"

She shrugged and he gave her a wide-eyed look. "He won't help us unless he believes us," she said.

Jamming his hands in his pockets, he shot the mage a glare. "This town sucks. In every possible way. Okay, Casey, you win. I'll be back as soon as I can."

* * *

It was the first time they'd been separated in a month and she was startled to realize that she actually _missed_ him. And not in a generic 'only person in the world that I know' kind of way, either. Ten minutes after Derek walked out of the room, she found herself missing his lopsided smile and his idiotic, off-the-wall insults.

She even missed his stupid black eye and that stupid cut on his cheek. Served him right for trying to take on an armor-plated giant, anyway, right? It didn't matter that he did it to keep her safe; that just made him all the more stupid for doing it in the first place.

Sighing, she dropped back into her chair and tried to distract herself from her misery by glaring at the mage, who was busy poking at the fire in the grate across the room.

"Do you make a habit holding young girls hostage, or is this a first for you?" she asked nastily.

He straightened to a standing position, but his expression remained mild and pleasant. "There's no need for that sort of thing," he said. "Consider my perspective, if you will. I have no reason to believe that you and your young man are anything but raving lunatics, roaming the countryside and leaking magic."

"Leaking magic?" she echoed, settling on the _most_ baffling thing he'd just said and deciding to work her way backwards from there. She'd get to the 'your young man' thing in a bit.

"Did I say lunatics?" he asked as he adjusted a jar on the mantel. "I probably meant to say _liars_ instead."

"Now hang on..." she said slowly, standing up and putting her hands on her hips.

With a glower, the mage spun to face her. The flickering firelight deepened the frown lines on his face, and her stomach dropped. "I convinced the bailiff and the magistrate to release you into my custody. I healed your young man. And against my better judgment, I find myself actually _listening_ to this blasphemous pack of lies you are telling me about the Door. I have been very tolerant so far, girl, but do _not_ push me."

She took an involuntary step backward. "I didn't mean to..."

"Who trained you?" he asked.

Her mouth fell open. "What are you _talking_...?"

"Whoever he or she was, they did a terrible job -- you have no shields whatsoever. Who knows what would have happened to the pair of you if I hadn't spoken to the magistrate personally."

Confused beyond reason, Casey didn't know how to even _begin_ to respond. It didn't really seem to matter, though; the mage was more or less talking to himself.

"And it's not as if you are particularly gifted, but _still_. An apprentice is an apprentice, after all, and there's just no excuse for poor--"

She couldn't bear to listen to it any more. Clearing her throat, she clapped her hands together as loudly as she could. "Hey!" she shouted.

And he actually stopped talking and scowled at her. "_What_?" he snarled.

"I have _no_ idea what you're talking about," she said sharply. "I'm not anybody's apprentice, and I'm not leaking or whatever. In case you hadn't figured it out, I'm not from around here, Magic Man." She quite liked Derek's little nickname; it had a nice, sarcastic twist to it. And he probably wouldn't mind if she borrowed it.

"It doesn't matter where you're from," he said in a tired voice, covering his face with a hand. "At least, it doesn't _seem_ to."

"Wait..." she drawled. "Are you saying...?"

He shrugged. "You appear to have a small degree of magical ability. It's probably how your young man won his fight. If what you say is true, you were helping him without knowing it."

By this point, her brain had stuttered to a full stop. There was only one thing she could think of to say, so she said it. "He's not my young man," she said. "He's just... he's Derek."

"Dirk?" the mage repeated, mangling the word.

Close enough, she figured, not bothering to correct him. "And you're wrong about the other thing, too. I'm not... it's not possible."

"You are, and it is. And if you are going to survive, girl, you need to master it," he said firmly.

Her mouth opened again, but she had absolutely no idea what was going to come out.

* * *

Whatever it was going to be, it didn't matter. Before she could even produce a squeak, the door banged open and Derek came storming into the room. "Jeez," he said loudly, throwing both of their old sacks to the ground, "you have _no_ idea how much money I had to give that inn-guy to get him to give me our stuff. You better be freaking in love with that orange underwear, Case."

"De-rek!" she shouted, grateful for the distraction. "Don't--"

"And I was thinking about it on the way back," he continued over her protests. "If all your, like, _under_ stuff was over there, that means that you haven't been wearing any--"

Leaping across the room before he could finish that sentence, she clapped one hand over his mouth and gave his forearm a hard pinch with the other. "You're an asshole, you know," she said viciously.

As they scuffled, the mage approached the bags and began riffling through them in a strangely efficient manner. "These are all of your belongings?" Thank God he'd shut up about that stupid magic stuff.

With a grunt, Derek twisted away from her and nodded. "We're minus a hell of a lot of gold coins, but I'm hoping we can get that sorted out soon enough."

"You are _not_ trying to fight for money again," she said, kicking his shin.

Wincing, he shot her a glare. "I didn't think that was an option, given what happened last time. And would you quit hurting me?"

The sword sang as the mage pulled it free from its sheath. He held it high in the air, examining the hilt carefully. "Interesting..." he said.

"What?" Derek asked blankly.

Instead of answering, the mage moved on to the bow, giving the string an experimental twang. He took an arrow out of the quiver and balanced it on a finger, tilting his head and wrinkling his nose. "You say the old man gave you these?"

It didn't escape Casey's notice that he failed to call the old man the Keeper, and disappointment washed through her. "We're never gonna get home," she muttered.

"Cheer up, Casey," Derek said, giving her a mock-cheerful smile. "He hasn't seen the knife-thing, yet."

"I believe this type of weapon is called a _dagger_, Dirk," the mage said, turning the dagger in question over in his hand.

"Did he just call me Dirk?" he asked with a sideways glance at her.

She shrugged. "I may or may not have said your name at some point during your absence. It's no big deal."

"You told him your name, too, right?"

"It never came up," she said, watching the mage examine her knife. "Hey, be careful with that!"

He gave her a disdainful look. "I am a scholar, girl. I am careful by nature."

"Her name's not 'girl,'" Derek said. "She's Casey."

Tilting her head, she raised an eyebrow at him.

"Well..." he said defensively. "Fair's fair, after all. If he knows my name, he should know yours. You done staring at that knife, there, Magic Man?"

"How you two managed to curry the favor of the Keeper, I'll never know," the mage replied with a sigh, flipping the dagger in the air so that it landed neatly on its tip, burrowing into the wooden table.

"Wait..." Casey said slowly. "Does that mean...?"

He shook his head. "The sword and the bow are ordinary, if quite old, weapons. But this dagger... it is clearly an ancient royal weapon, long gone from history. I actually have a sketch of it somewhere, if you'd like to see. What I find most peculiar is that your dagger should be more than a thousand years old, and yet it looks like new. While not definitive proof, it is enough to convince me that you are not lying."

"Well, _duh_," Derek said, rolling his eyes. "So you'll help us?"

"I will," he confirmed with a nod. "If nothing else, the sooner I send you on your way, the less likely it will be that the magistrate realizes that you two used magic to win that money and puts you in the stocks and turns me out of town for lying through my teeth."

"But we didn't," Derek said. "We already _told_ you that."

"Well," Casey said in a near-whisper. "Not intentionally."

His head jerked around so quickly that she was surprised he didn't hurt himself. "What?"

"He told me that I'm leaking magic," she told him. "Whatever _that_ means."

"Did you tell him that he was insane?"

"I tried," she said.

"You know," the mage interrupted irritably, "I'm right here. It's very rude to speak as if I'm not in the room."

"Oh, that's just great!" Derek cried. "We're in hell, and you get to have magic powers? How is _that_ fair?"

She bit back a grin. "Well... you've got a sword," she eventually said.

"Doesn't even compare," he said dismissively. "I don't know how to use my sword at _all_, and the last time I tried, I almost got shish-kebab-ed."

If she didn't go ahead and tell him, it would be even worse when he did find out. "The last time I apparently tried to use my magic, we got thrown in jail."

"You mean..." His face twisted and then fell. "I didn't actually Vulcan neck-pinch that guy?"

"Not entirely," she admitted. "Or, maybe you did a _little_, but it shouldn't have worked as well as it did."

Grumbling, Derek threw himself into the cushioned chair so hard it almost toppled over. "It's not fair," he said again to no one in particular.

"So you will stay?" the mage asked them both. "I will do my best to help you find your way to the Door."

"Yeah, sure," she said. "And I guess I could use some help with that magic thingy, so I don't, like, blow Derek up next time or something."

He pulled out his book of matches and started flipping the cover open and closed with a morose expression. "Nice, Case. I feel the love."

"Oh, shut up," she shot back, fed up with the pouting. "It's not like I want to have to deal with this stuff. You want magic? Go ahead and take it."

"It doesn't work that way, Cassie."

Derek rolled his eyes. "It's _Casey_, dude. Learn the language."

"Be nice," she said. "At least he's trying. Smelly Guy didn't even bother learning our names."

Pocketing his matches, he stood up. "Whatever. Look, I'm tired. Can someone point me in the direction of a bed?"

"That might be a bit of a problem," the mage said, frowning. "I only have one."

Casey hoped against hope that they figured out how to get to the Island of Fire _soon_.

* * *


	8. But They Had to Finish Their Quest

A/N: So, um, yeah. Like I've said before, I'm a slow poster because I'm hella-busy in RL, but three weeks in between posts is long even for me. It doesn't help that the plot has more or less run away with its bad self, but I'm pretty sure _that's_ going to turn out to be a good thing in the long run. Anyway, thanks for reading and for putting up with my A/N flightiness!

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Eight: But They Had to Finish Their Quest

"And life continues to be massively unfair," he grumbled to himself.

All the way from across the room, Casey's head jerked up, and she shot him a filthy glare. "Shut up, Derek. I need to concentrate."

"See? That totally proves my point," he said, wondering just when her hearing got so good, anyway. "You get... magic lessons or whatever, and I have to sit here reading dusty old books that aren't even written in a language I understand."

"Magic Man cast a spell on them for you," she pointed out in that reasonable voice that made him want to throw something at her.

He slammed his book shut. "Yeah, well, Magic Man can cram it someplace _really_ uncomfortable for all I care."

Her expression was blank with confusion. "Huh?"

Rolling his eyes, he pushed himself out of his chair and stalked toward the doorway. "I'm going... somewhere else. Anywhere else. Have fun mastering the elements, Case."

He hadn't even managed to take a dozen damn steps into the hallway before he felt her hand on his shoulder, pulling at him.

"_What_?" he barked, spinning around to scowl down at her.

"Do you actually think I _like_ doing all this stupid magic stuff?" she asked furiously. "Derek, all I do is sit at that table and stare at that damn bottle. I wake up, I stare at the bottle, I go to sleep. For the last _five_ days. It's so boring that even the mage has stopped trying to watch."

"I--" She cut him off by poking a finger into his chest. "Hey, ow!"

With a snarl, she just prodded him harder. "And do you remember why I have to stare at the bottle? Because I'm _dangerous_. I can't even go outside until I figure out how to turn off my magic, and I can't even figure out how to turn it _on_!"

Okay, so he didn't really have an answer for that one. Plus, he was afraid she might poke him again.

"So, yeah, Derek. I get to have all the fun magic bottle-staring lessons I want, and _you_ get to lie around, reading books and helping Magic Man find a way to send us home. Guess what _I_ think is massively unfair?" There was a deranged look in her eyes at this point, and it kind of worried him.

So of course, his stupid mouth had to go and betray him yet again. "So why don't you just do whatever it is you're supposed to do to the bottle?" he asked before he could prevent himself.

Her cheeks reddened. "Why don't I... _De-rek_!" she shouted, flinging both her hands in the air toward him.

And it felt like invisible hands flew against his chest and shoved him into the wall. Stumbling, he fell to the floor and landed flat on his back, staring up at her with round eyes.

It could have been worse, though. Casey was staring down at him with an equally dumbfounded expression. "Did I just..."

He couldn't help it. "Glad to help you work through your bottle anxieties, Case. Beats the hell out of reading those boring books," he said with a grin.

"Ooh," she fumed, recollecting herself and storming back into the study. As she stamped her foot in anger, the door automatically slammed shut behind her and Derek chuckled.

* * *

"I'm not jealous, you know," he said as he stripped off his shirt.

Sighing, she continued to brush her hair. "Shut up, Derek. My head hurts."

"Seriously," he said. "You can keep your dumb magic. And if you want to read the books, you're welcome to that, too."

"Oh, my God," she moaned. "You're deaf, right? That's the only possible explanation for your complete inability to hear a single word I say."

"I can... well, I don't know. I'll figure out some way to contribute," he said pointedly. "Maybe I could earn all of our money or something. Make sure we're safe from people that apparently want to kill us."

She dropped the brush on the table and glared at him. "Okay, you've made your point. Can you just _drop_ it? I want to go to sleep."

He pointed at the bed. "Nothing's stopping you, princess."

Moving in a unison that had become a very surreal routine over the last week or so, they extinguished the oil lamps and crawled into the bed. Casey immediately rolled onto her stomach and buried her head in her pillow, but Derek just tucked an arm under his head and stared up at the ceiling, thinking.

The mage hadn't been lying about the bedroom situation, but he'd offered it to them with a question in his eyes and neither of them had been able to bring themselves to say no. If that meant that the mage thought they were... more than they actually were, well, Derek was willing to accept that as a consequence for a warm, soft bed.

Besides, it wasn't like he was going to let _Casey_ have the bed all to herself while he slept on the floor. And while he knew the mage didn't have it in him to turn guests out into the cold, he didn't know what the going opinion was in this place regarding bed-sharing between people who weren't, well, married or whatever. Ick.

But all things considered, it wasn't too bad. Once he accepted that Casey was going to take all of the blankets the instant she fell asleep and she forgave him for kicking her so hard in his sleep that he apparently left bruises, everything worked out more or less okay.

Over on her side of the bed, she snuffled and stretched out a leg, nudging him unintentionally. Her toes were like ice. But if he said something, she'd wake up, and one of the many things Derek had learned over the last couple of weeks was that he preferred a sleeping Casey above an awake Casey -- she was a hell of a lot less annoying.

Although, if someone had a gun to his head -- _knife to your throat_, a little voice in the back of his head corrected, _no guns here, remember, stupid? _ -- he'd have to admit that she wasn't nearly as annoying as she used to be. Of course, his opinion was probably colored by the fact that their current survival depended on their ability to get along.

Which still wasn't awesome. But they apologized afterwards more often than they used to, and that had to count for something, right?

And he _had_ to get on her nerves a little bit. It reminded him of home, and he needed to remember that was where he wanted to be. Home, where Casey screeched at him at least a dozen times a day, and Edwin would lend him as much money as he wanted, and he and Casey were going to college in less than three months. Hockey scholarships and impending adulthood. Everything he'd been looking forward to.

Derek blew out a deep breath and an elbow landed in his gut.

"Stop thinking so loud," Casey muttered sleepily. "I'm tired."

"That doesn't even make sense," he replied.

Those icy toes poked his shin again. "It does if you've had the sort of day I have," she said. "Nothing but impossible nonsense."

"Are you telling me your stupid magic lets you read my mind?" he asked, tensing ever-so-slightly at the mere thought.

"No," she said, either ignoring or not hearing his relieved sigh, "but you keep moving around, and it's distracting me."

Playfully, he rolled over onto her side of the bed and wrapped his arms around her waist. "Is this better?" he whispered in her ear.

"Jeez, you're like a damn _furnace_," she exclaimed. "Get off me, Derek."

"You, Spacey," he said, retreating back to his own side, "are no fun whatsoever."

"Remind me to tell you all the things that are horribly wrong with that sentence tomorrow morning," she said with a loud yawn. "Now, go to sleep."

"You're not the boss of me," he said, but his eyes were slipping shut of their own accord.

He heard the blankets rustle as she curled into her pillow again. "De-rek," she said in a soft, sleepy voice.

It occurred to him then that this was his favorite moment of every day and his eyes snapped open again. That thought kept him awake long after Casey drifted off, snoring lightly.

* * *

The sound of shattering glass jerked him out of a light doze and he almost flipped his chair over. Not, of course, that anyone would have noticed even if he had.

Casey was too busy glaring at Magic Man, who was too busy looking like he wanted to strangle Casey. Which, given the fact that they'd spent the last five or six hours hunched over that table, wasn't all that surprising -- Derek knew from first-hand experience that Casey tended to have that effect on people.

"You must _concentrate_, girl," the mage said, shoving his spectacles up his nose and sighing.

"I'm _trying_!" she retorted, sounding agonized. "But it's too hard."

"No one said it would be easy, Cassie," he said, more gently now.

Their names had proven beyond the mage's pronunciation, and the one time the mage had told them his own name, Derek hadn't even gotten past the first two syllables. So they all did the best they could, and the first time Derek had called him 'Magic Man' in earnest, the mage laughed so hard he started coughing. He responded to it, though, and that was what mattered.

"Why do I have to learn this stuff anyway?" she asked in a sullen voice. "You said I'll never be able to actually _do_ anything important with it."

That didn't sound much like Casey to him. Casey _hated_ giving up. But he didn't say anything -- he saw a weird expression go across the mage's face and decided it would be better to keep pretending to read his awful, awful book.

"Tell me again how you and Dirk chanced upon the Door, child," he said.

Relief spread across her features, and he wondered briefly what _she_ thought Magic Man was going to say. "We were following his little sister. When she opened the Door, there was just a regular garden on the other side. But we argued and fell on it somehow, and when we went through it, we came here."

"Well, I cannot say for certain, but it appears to me that the reason the Door acted as it did for you and your friend might have something to do with your magic," he told her.

Her brow furrowed and Derek craned his neck over his book, straining to hear her response. "That doesn't make any sense," she said. "The first weird thing like that was us falling through the Door. If you were right, then magical things would have been happening to me my whole life, and they haven't."

Derek thought about it for a minute and had to agree with her. Up until whatever the hell it was had happened to them, they were pretty normal kids with a pretty standard suburban upbringing. If Casey was bleeding off magic or whatever the mage said, he would have noticed something weird about her. Well, weird_er_, anyway.

"Then consider everything that has happened to you since you entered our country," he said.

Tilting her head, she started to count off her fingers as she talked. "Well, I got bitten by that fairy, but that could have happened to anyone apparently. And then we found the Keeper, but since we came through the Door, that's probably not too strange. He gave us those weapons, and I guess I wondered why he gave _me_ the bow and Derek the sword, but me being magic doesn't have anything to do with that."

"Probably not," the mage agreed. "I would say that you both have had use of your weapons independent of magic."

"Yeah," she said, "I don't know what would have happened when that knight attacked us if I hadn't had the bow."

"Knight?" he repeated.

She ducked her head in a nod. "Some big scary guy wearing armor came up to us right before we got into town and tried to, uh, well, that is..." she trailed off delicately.

There probably wasn't any use in pretending he wasn't listening. "He wanted to be your very _special_ friend, Case," he called across the room.

With a grimace, she rolled her eyes at him. "Thanks, Derek. That's a mental image I _really_ wanted."

"Any time," he shot back with a wry smile.

"Anyway," she said loftily. "Derek challenged him to a duel... sort of. But I shot him with an arrow to make him go away so he wouldn't murder Derek."

"Are you telling me that you managed to successfully injure a man wearing full armor with just an arrow?" the mage asked, frowning.

She shrugged. "Lucky shot -- it hit him in between two plates."

"And are you particularly _skilled_ at archery, Cassie?" He sounded sarcastic now, and Casey blushed as if on cue.

"Well, no," she admitted. "But like I said..."

He flapped his hand at her. "Cassie, I can safely say that there's absolutely no way for someone with_out_ magic to do something like that without years and years of training."

Staring down at the table, she picked up a piece of the shattered bottle and started tracing a pattern with it on the surface. "So?"

"So?" he echoed.

"Yeah," she said, giving him a defiant scowl. "_So_? Magic helps and magic hurts. Big whoop. Thanks for the trip down memory lane."

Wow. That sounded almost like... _him_. She must really be stressed out.

"While you are here, at least, magic plays a role in your life," the mage said in a lecturing sort of voice. "Either you learn to control it, or it will continue to control you."

Smirking, Derek returned to his book. Magic Man had her now -- hook, line, and sinker. Nothing pissed Casey off more than the thought of _not_ being in complete control. Of everything. Up to and including stuff that wasn't any of her damn business, like him.

There was a long, awkward pause, during which she glared hard at the mage, who was giving her a sort of knowing look that Derek didn't trust for a second.

"All right," she eventually said. "You have another bottle?"

"Are you going to throw it at me again?" Magic Man countered mildly.

* * *

She settled down some after that, and the grade-grubbing, perfectionist Casey he knew so well started coming out to play. Of course, this was different than pulling off a good grade in calculus. Way more entertaining, if nothing else.

After lunch, Derek finished reading some old historical thing that didn't mention the Island of Fire _once_ and was trying to get through an ancient wizard's diary that translated so badly into English he was only able to make out every third word or so. That was when Casey finally got her shit together, apparently, and Derek actually trailed off reading to watch.

"See, is that so hard?" the mage asked her.

Sweating with exertion, she barely managed to roll her eyes, not taking them off the gently floating bottle for an instant. All the way across the room, he saw a muscle twitch in her jaw.

"Are you really doing that, Casey?" Derek asked, trying and failing to sound unimpressed.

At which point, she obviously lost control and the bottle went crashing to the table. "De-rek!" she cried.

"No matter, child," the mage said, interrupting the fight before it could get started at all. "That was just fine. Now, do you feel what I described to you?"

She wrinkled her nose. "Sort of. Like a buzz? Only not in my ears."

"It's not the same for everyone," he said with a shrug. "And I confess that I've never attempted to train someone with so small an ability."

"Dude, you don't have to say it to her _face_," Derek broke in, closing the book and giving him a mocking glare. "She can't help it if she's talentless."

"One more word from you, Dirk, and you'll be banned from the study permanently," Magic Man said sternly.

With a wide grin, he stood up. "Really? No more reading boring books? Oh, _please_ ban me, Mister Magic Man!"

Casey snorted. "You'd be punishing him more if you made him stay. Don't you have a spell or something to shut him up instead?"

"A big part of learning how to use your magic is learning when _not_ to use it, Cassie. If I used a spell to silence Dirk, what would the consequences be?"

"Maybe," she began in an eager tone that sort of worried him, "he'd get really scared of you, and then he'd never talk again, and then we could..."

"Or, superfreak," Derek interrupted pointedly, "maybe he meant the spell could backfire and I'd wind up a frog for life or something like that, when if you just tell me to shut up, the worse that could happen is I don't and you never get the joy of playing a more obnoxious Anakin Skywalker to a much taller, slightly less evil Emperor ever again."

The mage cleared his throat. "I was actually going to discuss the dangers of becoming overly dependent on magic use and depleting your stores. Who is this Emperor you speak of? I thought you said you weren't royalty."

Derek bit his lip and waited to see what Casey was going to say.

Which was absolutely the wrong thing to do, of course. Because Casey had to go and ruin the totally potentially awesome joke by being _boring_. "Stores?" she chose to echo. "What do you mean?"

"Most magic users cannot simply pluck raw power from the air. Although there are legends..." he trailed off in obvious thought, but as Casey stared at him, he coughed and offered her an awkward smile. "Anyway. For users such as you and I, we have a certain amount of magical energy, and once it is gone, that's it. That is one of the many reasons you need to learn how to shield, Cassie. Else your magic may run out at a time when you truly need it."

"Because I don't have much," she said dully. And Derek sort of felt bad about teasing her earlier; not, of course, bad enough to actually _apologize_, though.

"Because we do not know what will be asked of you," he corrected in a gentle voice. "You two are still a long way from home, and Dirk has made little headway in his research."

At which point, Derek fumbled with the old book and started squinting at the pages again. "Hey, I'm trying," he said defensively. "It's not my fault that your books read like stereo instructions. Written in Swahili. Why'd you give me some old diary to read, anyway?"

"The mage who wrote the log you are currently reading is one of very few who claimed to have opened the Door. He never crossed over, but I have high hopes that he describes the different pathways to enlightenment, including your Island of Fire," Magic Man said patiently.

Yeah, so he didn't really have anything to say to that, because everything that popped into his head was horribly insulting. Instead, he turned to Casey with a bright smile. "So magic buzzes?" he asked.

She grinned. "None of your business. Get to work, Venturi; the Island of Fire won't find itself."

"Yeah, yeah," he complained. "If the dude that wrote this book found enlightenment, my name is Sparkly Prince Twinkle-Toes."

* * *

Three days later, he woke up with Casey sprawled all over him, snoring in his left ear. As soon as he was conscious, he shoved her away so hard that she actually rolled off the bed and fell to the floor.

"Rough dream?" he asked snidely as she gave him a bleary scowl.

"If you just pushed me out of bed, I swear I'll..." But she was too disoriented to get any further into her threat.

His eyes widened in an innocent stare. "Casey, I can't believe you'd think so little of me. Why, I'm just--"

"Save it," she said, holding up a hand. "It's too early to be listening to your bullshit. I need to practice, anyway."

As she tied her hair back and changed her clothes, he almost confessed. Fortunately, she was out of the room before he lost his mind that completely.

* * *

The very next day, she learned how to turn off her magic.

"It's gone," she said. "The buzzing. I didn't realize how _loud_ it was until it wasn't there any more."

The mage squinted at her. "You're fully shielded, Cassie. Now, can you bring your shield down again?"

Tilting her head, she just blinked. After a pause, she nodded at the ever-present bottle on the table. It obediently rose about six inches in the air, hovering unsteadily under the mage's nose.

"I'm never going to get used to that," Derek called.

She flicked her head and the bottle abruptly flew toward him.

On instinct, he dropped his book and threw himself to the ground. The bottle thudded gently against the chair he'd been sitting in, and Casey laughed at him until tears ran down her face.

* * *

"Hey, Casey?" he asked in the darkness that night.

She hummed.

"What's that magic stuff like?"

The blankets rustled as she turned onto her side. "It's... well, it's like you're in a room you've never been in before, and it's totally dark. You're bumping around, knocking everything over, and then suddenly, you find the light switch. Once the lights are on, everything's easy."

He couldn't keep the jealousy out of his voice. "So... it's easy now?"

"Magic Man said I've learned about all I can," she said. "Basically, if you need anything lighter than a glass bottle floated across a room, I'm your girl. Otherwise, you're gonna need to call someone else."

"That's still pretty damn cool, Casey," he said, wondering why he was even willing to discuss this with her. "_I_ can't even do that."

"Yeah, but you have your super-slap-shot powers," she replied lightly.

It took him a long time to get it. "I can't believe you even remember the stupid stuff I said that first night we were here."

She yawned. "It was a pretty memorable night. Plus, I _have_ seen your slap shot."

"Liar," he said mildly, flopping on his stomach and curling his arms around his pillow. "You don't even know what a slap shot _is_."

"Just because I don't know anything about dumb old football doesn't mean I don't know about other sports. And I've seen you play hockey plenty, Derek. _Someone_ used to make me wait around during practices to get a ride home." But her tone was weirdly affectionate.

He smiled, knowing she couldn't see it. "You really think I have a super slap shot?" he asked in a teasing voice.

Her fingers dug into his side ticklishly. "Don't push it, Captain Venturi."

* * *

"And Casey couldn't come with us _why_?" Derek asked irritably.

Next to him, Magic Man shrugged. "She said something about a headache and not wanting you to talk her into another insane scheme. Her words, not mine."

He rolled his eyes. "Even when it's not actually my fault, it's my fault. Nice."

"She does seem to enjoy blaming you," he said in a guarded tone.

"She _thrives_ on it," Derek said. "It's like, a way of life or something. The universe according to Casey."

The mage gave him a sideways glance as they walked. "I had wondered at what brought the pair of you together. You don't seem to like each other very much, and yet you are somehow inseparable at the same time."

"It's... complicated," he eventually settled on. "Me and Casey, well, we know each other too well to actually hate each other. At least, _I_ don't hate _her_. But at the same time, she's really fun to piss off, so I can't help it."

With a long sigh, he just shook his head. "You two come from a very strange place."

"I hear you, dude."

"I find it difficult to believe that you actually want to _return_ to such a place," he said.

Derek shrugged. "Why not? It's home. Besides, it's not like this place isn't horrible, too. Just in a more... medieval way."

"Medieval?" the mage echoed.

"Like, old and stuff," he said, struggling to remember what he'd learned in history class and settling instead for what he remembered from a made-for-TV movie about King Arthur. "Swords and knights and shit. Where I come from, we're sort of beyond all that. We've got computers and airplanes and TiVo."

The mage shoved his hands somewhere in his robes. "As I said... very strange."

After the ensuing silence grew too awkward to bear, Derek found himself flapping his hands in the air like an idiot. "Are the streets always so quiet? They were like this when we first got here, too."

"Only on market days. We need food, remember?" Magic Man asked, twisting his lips into a smirk.

"And here I was, thinking you were just taking me on an intimate little walk," he retorted, returning the smirk with one of his own. "But now that you mention it, I _do_ recall a rather cutting remark you made about me eating you out of house and home."

Then they were in the market throng and there was no real way to talk.

It was just as bad as Derek remembered -- the crowd, the sweat, the _stink_. Fortunately, though, the mage appeared to know where he was going, so all Derek had to do was follow along and hold the things that got periodically shoved into his hands.

"Almost done," the mage said somewhere around the tenth cart they visited.

"That's good," he replied, shuffling a bag full of weird yellow oranges to his other hand, "because I don't think I can carry any more."

As he turned to the next cart, however, he ran into a wall of metal, flinging food everywhere. The wall _rumbled_, and its voice rang an ominous bell in the back of Derek's mind.

A few people turned to gawk at the knight, who was towering over Derek, and a couple of them called out in whatever weird language they spoke around here. In reply, the knight just laughed.

"Um... Magic Man?" Derek asked as softly as he could. "Do you happen to know what's going on?"

"Not really," the mage replied, equally quietly. "The man in the armor up there is..." And he said the name, but as usual, Derek didn't catch it. "We also call him the Butcher."

"Butcher?" he asked, gulping.

The knight spoke again. It didn't sound friendly.

"Those people warned him against incurring the wrath of the Magical Warrior, but the Butcher laughed," Magic Man continued to translate.

"Yeah, I got that part," he said, trying to keep his voice from trembling.

"And he just now said that he's faced you in fair combat before, and he saw nothing magical about you."

He was transfixed by the armor, glinting dully in the light. "You mean that I accidentally got in a swordfight with a man whose nickname is the _Butcher_?"

The mage was staring at him in horror. "Don't tell me that this is the man who..."

With a short nod, he started easing away from the knight as subtly as he could. "Maybe he'll just let me..."

This time, when the knight spoke, he tightened his right hand into a fist, the metal gauntlet clanking ominously.

"Your Cassie dealt him a blow," Magic Man said. "An insult to his pride. You understand that he can't let such a thing go unchallenged."

"Of course not," Derek said faintly.

He was totally going to die.

What _was_ it about this place that made people want to beat the shit out of him?

The last thing he saw before the world exploded under his eyelids was the knight's fist heading straight for his face.

* * *

"Don't try to talk," the mage said unnecessarily.

Derek grunted, which was meant to translate to, '_I totally wasn't going to try, you stupid moron_,' but Magic Man didn't seem to understand it.

"You're very lucky, you know," he continued. "Your jaw should have been shattered, not just dislocated. I could have fixed it right there, but I assumed you'd want something for the pain immediately afterward, so it would be best for us to return home."

Another grunt. This one meant '_Shut up. Don't you realize you're humiliating me even more_?'

But again, it was ignored. "It's a very good thing that you feigned unconsciousness after that first blow, too. The Butcher was quite satisfied, and many rumors of your magical victory have been openly contradicted."

He stayed silent. If Magic Man thought he'd been putting on a good show, Derek was willing to go with it. There was no reason for anyone to know that he really had gotten his lights knocked out with just one punch.

It had been a hell of a punch, though. His face ached just thinking about it. Well, it ached when he didn't think about it, too. The sooner they got back home and the mage popped his jaw back into place, the better. And the cut on his face, which had been healing quite nicely, had been ripped open again.

This time, when he grunted, it meant, '_Why do these things happen to_ me?'

And the mage clapped a hand on his shoulder. "It's not your fault, Dirk. Maybe you're just naturally drawn to trouble."

* * *

The door to the mage's home opened just as they came in sight of the house, and Casey came tumbling out. "What did you do?" she asked, marching up to Derek and giving him a fierce glare.

He pasted on his best wide-eyed 'Who, me?' look and pointed at his jaw.

"Don't give me that," she said furiously. "You've been fighting again, haven't you? You're _covered_ in blood."

"Cassie," the mage muttered. "Maybe the middle of the street isn't the best place to--"

"You promised, Derek!" she cried. "You told me you wouldn't do this kind of thing any more, and as soon as you got back to that damn market, you went back and..." Growling, she threw her hands up in the air.

And a handful of rocks at her feet responded to the motion by flying off the ground and through several nearby windows.

Casey went pale as the angry shouts rose up. "Oops..." she whispered.

* * *

"Oops," Derek echoed snidely, rubbing at his newly re-located jaw. "You go and blow our fucking cover, and all you can say is _oops_?"

Casey looked miserable. Well, good. "Derek, I--"

But he wasn't having it. "You blame me for every damn thing that goes wrong in your life, you know. And when I get nearly killed like three times because of _you_, and then you turn around and put on a little magic show for the neighbors, and it's just _oops_."

"Would you stop saying that?" she asked quietly, tears swimming in her eyes.

"They're gonna come after us with pitchforks and torches, Casey," he said venomously. "I think I'm entitled."

Her face contorted, and when she spoke, it was like the words were literally being torn from her. "You're right, okay?" she cried. "I've screwed everything up, and gotten you hurt, and I've been a total bitch about it the whole time. Everything that's happened has been my fault, and I've blamed you for all of it!"

And while most of him agreed wholeheartedly with her, there was that little bit leftover that remembered her soft, drowsy voice talking him to sleep every night, and he caved like the idiot he really was, deep down. "Well, not _everything_," he said grudgingly. "This last fight, though, I'm blaming you for _completely_."

* * *

"That's the best I could do on short notice," Magic Man said, dumping a pile of clothes on the ground with a sigh. "The magistrate has apparently been notified -- I expect him to arrive within the hour."

Derek nudged the clothes with a foot. "What's all this stuff?"

"You must go to the snow plains in the north," he replied. "There lies your best chance of finding the Island of Fire, I believe. But you need supplies for such a journey. There should be a couple of weeks' worth of food, adequate bedding, and enough clothing as long as you walk at a brisk enough pace to stay warm."

"How much did all this cost?" Casey asked suspiciously, beginning to sort the pile into two individual stacks.

"Oh, don't worry," Magic Man said loftily. "I used your money for all of this. You won't need it where you're going -- no one in their right mind would attempt to live on the snow plains."

That sort of irritated him. Like a lot, if he gave it much thought. He'd worked hard for that money, after all; but he was too busy being distracted by something else to get really angry. "Wait..." he began slowly. "Are you telling me you knew where the Island of Fire was this whole time?"

His expression was unapologetic. "Cassie had to master her magic, and you needed something to do. Now, I have some travel sacks stored in the bedroom. If you would be so kind as to fetch them, I need to have a word with your young lady here."

He stomped off in a huff, too furious to even _think_. He spent two whole weeks reading those awful, dusty books. For nothing! To learn something they already knew.

As he grabbed the sacks and picked up their weapons, he took a moment to wish that he knew how to use his sword better. Bashing the hell out of a smartass mage would sure feel good right about now.

Whatever they were talking about while he was gone, it was apparently something he wasn't allowed to hear. The instant he stepped back into the room, the mage stopped talking and started shoving stuff into bags. Casey slung her bow across her shoulders but wouldn't meet his eyes.

"Do you have, like, a map or something, since you obviously know exactly which way to go?" he asked irritably, slipping his sword belt around his waist.

"It is not so easy," the mage replied, handing them each a bag. "All I know is that you must go to the north."

He almost -- _almost_ -- said exactly what was running through his mind but managed to hold it in at the last second. After all, Magic Man hadn't been _entirely_ unhelpful; he'd fed and housed them, healed Derek's multiple injuries, and taught Casey just enough about magic for her to totally screw it up. They probably owed him something for all of that, even if he was a lying bastard who'd just spent all of their money.

At the door, Derek forced himself to stick out his hand. "Well, thanks for everything, Magic Man. It's been peachy keen."

"Derek," Casey hissed, nudging him in the ribs. "_Don't_."

And she wasn't off the hook, either. "Seriously," he said, grabbing the mage's hand and giving it a good shake. "You did a bunch of nice stuff for us when you didn't have to. I appreciate it."

Casey chose to lean forward and give him a hug. "I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to--"

"Don't worry about it, child," the mage said with a toothy smile. "I'm the only mage for a great distance -- the magistrate doesn't dare do anything too drastic to me. But if you two don't get out of here, it'll be the stocks for you both."

"Yeah, and as fun as that sounds," Derek drawled. "I think we have a date with a big pile of snow and a magical Fire Island, whatever that is."

Shaking his head, the mage just kept smiling. "I can't believe it, but I think I'm going to miss you, Dirk." He pointed at a spot on the horizon. "Now, _go_."

As they went down the street, Casey kept looking over her shoulder at the house. "He was the first person here that wasn't horrible to us. I hope he doesn't get into trouble."

He huffed. "Weren't you listening to him? He's the great and terrible Oz or something. He'll be fine."

"Still..."

"Look, Casey," he said, exasperated, "if you're going to worry about something, you should worry about _us_. Or even about how I'm going to totally find a way to get even with you for getting us thrown out of town."

Her expression told him that he couldn't have hurt her worse if he'd actually hit her.

"Jeez," he said with an eye-roll, "if you're going to be all sensitive and prissy, this is going to be a really _long_ trip. You know I don't actually mean it when I say shit like that, Case."

"Yeah," she replied, sounding completely unconvinced.

"Besides," he continued brightly, trying to hide the fact that it was sort of bothering him that she obviously didn't believe him, "we've got to stick together, right? That's your little theory about us getting home."

She smiled -- just a thin little twitch of the lips -- and hitched her bag up on her shoulders. "Right. You and me and the snow plain of the north."

"I've never heard of a snow _plain_ before," he said in a thoughtful tone. "Wonder what it's going to be like."

After a long pause, she smiled again, and it was much closer to genuine. "Cold, probably."

"Is _that_ what all of this stuff is for? I thought you just liked lugging around loads of heavy shit for the fun of it," he groused.

"De-rek!"

Well, it was kind of nice that some things stayed the same, even if everything else was quickly going to hell. Smiling for absolutely no reason, he started to whistle a random tune. This was good -- they were going home.

* * *


	9. So They Went to Play in the Snow

A/N: Just to keep you on your toes, the Author's Note follows the chapter this time.

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Nine: So They Went to Play in the Snow

This was bad. In a whole _multitude_ of ways.

First of all, lately she'd gotten entirely too used to spending her days, well, not walking for hours on end. They had crossed out of the town less than four hours ago, and already, she was tired, her knees were sore, and she was pretty sure she had a blister on the heel of her left foot.

At the time, she hadn't realized Magic Man had spoiled them as much as he apparently had. She'd been too busy fantasizing about taking that stupid glass bottle and shoving it right up his...

Okay. Not productive. Thinking things like that didn't do anything to help her deal with the badness that was right now.

More to the point, it didn't help her deal with _Derek_.

Oh, he was doing a good job being all _sly_ for now. He kept doing stuff like sticking his hands in his pockets and whistling as they walked along. Every now and again, he'd kick at a rock and give her a cheerful smile as it went skipping along in the grass.

He was acting so normal that it was going to kill her.

That was probably his plan, of course. He knew that she knew how mad he was at her. Honestly, how could he _not_ be? She was furious with herself for messing things up in the town so badly; the tentative truce they'd reached all those weeks ago had to have gone the way of the dodo the second the latch closed on Magic Man's door.

Anyway, Derek was up to his old tricks again, being all sneaky and manipulative and making her feel guilty by pretending he wasn't enraged. Well, she'd show him. She didn't feel guilty at all. Not even a little.

At least when she got angry at him, she did it properly. Sullen silences and dirty looks, and Derek trailing after her like a kicked puppy. Well, maybe less a puppy and more a sarcastic, irritated wolf, but her point was still salient. _She_ had the decency to treat him like shit in an obvious way.

This see-no-evil, telltale-heart crap just wasn't going to cut it.

If only she weren't _so_ horribly sorry for what she'd done, she might have attempted to call him on it. As it stood, she just followed along as he all but skipped in the direction Magic Man had pointed toward, almost knocking him over when he came to an abrupt stop.

"I'm tired," he said, apparently not noticing the fact that she was trying not to fall flat on her face in her efforts to keep from bumping into him.

Or... he _did_ notice and he was delighting in her misery. "Okay..." she replied quietly.

"I think we should bunk down here," he told her. "What do you think? There's only, like, an hour of daylight left or so, and the ground is pretty flat here."

She nodded. Tonight, what Derek wanted, Derek would get. It would be her little punishment for herself. "I'll go find some firewood," she said, letting her bag drop to the ground.

He gave her a confused look but was apparently unwilling to look a gift pack-mule in the mouth. "Yeah, you go do that," he said, putting his own sack down and starting to rummage through it. "I'm gonna see what Magic Man spent my hard-earned cash on."

It didn't take long to find enough wood to start a decent fire, and Derek didn't look ashamed at all as he tossed her the little book of matches. There were only a few left and she made a mental note to try and remember what Magic Man told her about starting fires. If anything. It all happened so fast -- it was hard to remember that they'd only spent a couple of weeks at his house; it felt like years in one way, but at the same time, everything he'd taught her blurred together into a jumbled mess.

"Hey, this jerky stuff isn't half bad," Derek said, chewing thoughtfully on something he'd pulled from his bag. "Wonder what it's made of."

She made a face. "You probably don't want to know."

"Good point." He kept chewing.

As she watched him eat, a tiny thought formed in the back of her head. It grew and grew, until it was almost screaming at her, and she couldn't bear to hold it in any longer. "Um... Derek..." she said carefully.

Oh, boy. This was going to make him furious.

"Yeah?" he asked, looking up from his food. There was a bit of jerky sticking out of the corner of his mouth, but if he was okay with it, then so was she. Tonight, at least.

"We should probably ration our food," she said all in a rush. "We don't know how long it's going to take us to find the Island, and we don't know if we'll be able to hunt along the way."

Narrowing his eyes, he just studied her for a moment.

He was going to blow up, and it was going to be _bad_. She could hear him now.

_Well, if_ you _hadn't gotten us thrown out of town, we wouldn't have to worry about shit like that. Besides, you don't need to eat much, right? We'll be fine, Case. At least, as good as we can be, given that I'm stuck with the biggest loser in Loserville. Maybe a bear will eat you and I won't have to bother letting you tag along any more. _

His head tilted to the side.

She was going to throw up.

Jeez, why did he have to draw it out like this? He was killing her by degrees.

His mouth opened. "You know..." he said in that same contemplative tone from earlier. "You're probably right. Good thinking, Spacey."

And he put the little package of jerky back in his bag.

With a sigh, she just buried her head in a bundle of clothing from her sack. He wouldn't be satisfied until he'd reduced her to hysterics, would he?

* * *

"Boy, my own sleeping bag," Derek said, sounding satisfied. "Well, it's more like my own bunch of blankets, but it's the thought that counts, right?"

"Right," she agreed miserably.

She wanted to die.

"How much does it suck that it feels like a luxury, too?" He kept _doing_ that. Just being... regular Derek. A pleasanter Derek, even. She was going to go insane.

"I am but mad north by northwest," she muttered to herself.

With a baffled expression, he looked up from his bedding. "What? Are you okay, Case? You've been acting weird all night. Well, weirder than usual, anyway."

Screw _Hamlet_. She was done waiting for him to jump all over her. "Why don't you just come out and say it, Derek?" she snarled.

He blinked. "What?" he asked dumbly.

"You're mad," she said.

"I am?"

"Furious," she confirmed. "You've been ready to murder me all afternoon. So just put me out of my misery and let me have it. It's the merciful thing to do, Derek!"

Slowly, painfully, he shook his head. "I don't know what the hell you're talking about, Casey."

Her hands curled into her own blankets, knuckles turning white. "You son-of-a-bitch!" she yelled. "Just admit it!"

"I wasn't angry before," he said with a frown, "but I'm getting there."

"You... but I messed everything up," she stammered in her confusion. "You said I blew our cover, and we had to run out of town and--"

He'd been staring at her, but now he started to laugh.

"You said you were going to get even," she finished lamely.

Tears were running down his face. "You mean you thought... and then I... oh, _fuck_, Casey..." he howled.

After a long minute, she sighed. "You weren't mad at all, were you?"

"Well, when I thought we were going to be chained up by our toes, I was. But we got out of town with no problem, and now we're on our way home," he said, wiping at his eyes. "But I have to say, that's the most awesome thing I've ever heard -- you totally did worse shit to yourself in two hours than I could have come up with in a month. I mean, look at you; you're a freaking wreck!"

And he was right, damn him. She was shaking all over, the tension that had been building since they started walking releasing all at once, and she couldn't decide whether to laugh or cry. In the end, she just curled into a ball and pulled her blanket over her head.

"Hey, you should look at me when I talk to you," Derek said playfully, "I might get _angry_ otherwise."

"I hate you," she said, closing her eyes and tuning out his raucous laughter.

* * *

"It's been three days," Derek whined. "What if Magic Man was wrong?"

"What if he wasn't?" she countered evenly.

He gave her a sideways glare. "Don't test my patience, young lady. I'm not done being mad at you."

Lips twitching, she just heaved a dramatic sigh. "Oh, whatever will I do? Derek Venturi is threatening me with his terrifying wrath," she said mockingly. "Derek, can't you just let it go?"

"Not when it's _that_ damn funny," he said. "I'll be rubbing that in your face when you're on your deathbed."

"Oh, God," she said distastefully, "that means you'll be at my deathbed. Well... maybe you'll have the decency to die before me."

He huffed. "As if. I plan on heckling you into an early grave."

"Women have a longer average lifespan than men, statistically speaking," she said in a prim voice.

"Yeah, well, 78 of all statistics are completely made up," he retorted. "Besides, what have I said about Venturis _always_ beating McDonalds? That includes living longer."

With a disdainful sniff, she gave him a nudge. "Given the number of head injuries you've sustained over the years, I wouldn't be taking any bets, there, _D-man_."

"My aggressive game is paying for my education, so shut up, Miss Priss," he said, dodging her elbow. "And what about _you_, anyway? If you haven't already developed a bleeding ulcer from freaking yourself out over _nothing_ all the damn time, I'll eat my left shoe."

"If I have an ulcer, it came from spending three years putting up with your bullshit," she retorted with a mocking smile. "Where did you get that statistic about stuff being made up, by the way? I mean, how could they do an accurate study on that sort of thing?"

He snorted. "Typical Casey."

_Oh_. She got it. "That's... you suck, Venturi," she said, blushing.

"You just don't want to admit that my sense of humor is infinitely superior to yours," he replied loftily.

Shaking her head, she just sighed. "Why does everything have to be a competition with you, Derek? I mean _everything_. Do you realize we've just spent five minutes arguing about who's going to die first? Don't you think that's weird?"

"Duh," he said with a shrug. "I think every conversation I have with you is weird."

"De-rek," she drawled, only halfway meaning it.

"Personally, I find it kind of offensive that you would use my demise as a diversion from my original question. Given how often I've had the crap beaten out of me lately, it's sort of in poor taste, Case." He gave her a glare, but the corners of his mouth trembled.

She debated whether or not to ignore him, but in the end, she knew that he wouldn't shut up if she did. Plus -- and this was something she wouldn't have admitted out loud for _anything_, up to and including Chinese water torture -- she was kind of having fun. "What question? I got distracted by you threatening me with death by lame-ass jokes."

"Okay, first point? My jokes are always nothing short of awesome -- if you're too lame to see that, then that's your problem. And second point? You're doing it again," he said, waving an admonishing finger through the air.

"If you don't shut up and ask your damn question, I'm going to shoot you," she retorted, tapping the strap on her quiver warningly. "Someplace painful."

He smirked at her. "My, my, such _violence_, Miss McDonald."

Struggling to keep from smiling, she cleared her throat and started to unsling her bow.

"Jeez, Casey," he said, wildly flapping his hands at her, "this place has changed you. And not in a good way."

"I'm waiting..." she sing-songed, toying with the bowstring.

"Earlier, I was inquiring as to the possibility of Magic Man erring in his supposition that we would find cooler climes to the north," Derek said in a snobby voice.

"Wow... I can't believe you just used all of those words correctly. _Climes_?" she echoed teasingly.

"Mostly," he continued as if she hadn't spoken, "because it's so freaking hot that I haven't stopped sweating since two days ago. Do we really have to carry all this shit around?"

"And he's back," she muttered. "Let me put it this way... which is worse: sweating now and being okay later, or being comfortable now and dying of exposure when we _do_ hit snow?"

Eyes narrowing, he hitched his bag higher on his shoulders. "Well... maybe what Magic Man thinks is snow isn't. Maybe his idea of snow is, like, cookies falling from the sky or something."

"Cookies?" she repeated in disbelief.

He shrugged. "You know what I mean. Language difficulties. We probably won't wind up using half of this stuff that he wasted our money on."

She couldn't believe she was actually listening to this. But she took a few seconds to think about it anyway. "Whatever it is in the magic that allows us to understand each other has been pretty accurate so far, though. And the weather around here isn't too different from ours, except for the two suns, obviously. I'd say that snow means _snow_."

"But--"

"No," she interrupted, shaking her head. "I'd rather be safe than sorry. Besides, it's not like it's that much extra stuff."

His shoulders slumped in a stunning impression of a much younger Marti at her most petulant. "But it's _heavy_," he whined.

She rolled her eyes. "You big baby. Here, let me carry your bag," she said, yanking it out of his hands. "There, does that make you feel better?"

Scowling, he snatched it back. "No way, princess. I'm not going to let you lord it over me the whole time because you carried everything. I'll do my share."

"Suit yourself," she said, putting her hand over her mouth to hide the smile.

But something must have given her away, because his scowl only deepened. "Oh, shut up, Casey," he said as he stomped off.

"I didn't say anything," she called toward his retreating back, unable to hold in the laughter for any longer.

* * *

"See, aren't you glad we kept all of the cold-weather stuff?" she asked chidingly.

He poked at the fire in an increasingly vain effort to keep it going -- it had been getting colder for the last few days, but today was the first time they'd had to walk through snow. Earlier in the day, it had just been on the ground, but some time during the afternoon, it started falling from the sky, and neither of them had any idea how to keep the fire protected.

The wood had been wet and didn't want to start, and once they got the fire going (using a five-dollar-bill from Derek's wallet that he _still_ hadn't stopped pouting about), it kept hissing and smoking as the snow fell. They both huddled around it, but it didn't make much difference.

"Fat lot of good it's doing," he retorted through chattering teeth. "I've never been so cold in my entire life."

She tilted her head and studied him. "You lose most of your body heat through your head." After a split second, she smirked. "That's probably your problem -- your head has always been pretty big."

"Oh... oh, _real_ nice, Case," he said, wrapping shaking arms around himself.

"We're Canadian, you know," she said pointedly, "although no one would know it from looking at you. Derek, you're out on the ice all the time -- aren't you at least a little used to the cold?"

"We're Canadians who live _indoors_," he spat. "You know, central heating? And when I'm on the ice, I've got fifty pounds of padding on and there's a fucking game going on. I don't have time to get cold."

With one last pathetic splutter, the fire died completely. Even the ashes were black with water.

"Shit," Derek said feelingly.

Sighing, Casey started pulling blankets out of her bag and piling them on top of herself. "Come here," she said before she could think better of it.

He blinked and she noticed that he had snowflakes caught in his eyelashes. "What?"

"If we're going to sleep out here in the open, we're going to need to share body heat. You have any better ideas?" she asked defensively.

His face split into a wide grin, but the bluish tinge to his lips somewhat spoiled the effect. "You know what they say is the best way to stay warm..." he drawled.

"To which I reply: you're a disgusting pig," she said. "Seriously, Derek, do you want to freeze to death?"

Gathering up his own blankets, he made his way over to her, managing to fling snow in her face as he plopped down to the ground. "Let's see... cuddling with Spacey or a slow death by hypothermia... man, that's a tough one..."

She thumped him in the back of the head. "We have to actually be in physical contact for this body heat thing to work, I think."

Together, they spread the blankets over themselves and curled up in the least uncomfortable position they could manage. "Yeah, I don't think I'm going to be able to sleep like this," Derek muttered.

"Not a whole lot I can do about the no-bathing situation, Venturi, so don't start," she retorted. "And you don't exactly smell like roses either, you know."

"I didn't actually mean that, although now that you mention it, you are a little less than fresh, Case. What I was thinking was more about the fact that every time I breathe in, your hair tries to leap down my throat and suffocate me," he said conversationally.

"Smart hair," she said before she could help herself.

He puffed a sigh of warm air across her scalp and she shivered involuntarily. "What have I said about the constant death threats? They're just not _nice_."

"Well, hang on, then, Mr. Sensitive." As carefully as she could, she twisted around onto her other side so that she was facing him. "Is this better?"

"Define better," he said with a sarcastic air. "But I think I'm feeling a little warmer."

It might have been her imagination, but her toes _did_ have a bit more feeling in them than they did earlier. "Me, too," she said. "So if we're going to do this, there have to be a couple of ground rules. Well, one, really."

"Let me guess: no wetting the bed. Because it would turn to icicles, and I don't even want to think about--"

"Oh, my God," she exclaimed in horror. "Have you lost your _mind_?"

She heard the chuckle in his chest long before it escaped his mouth. "Hey," he said defensively, "I think my point is valid."

"Anyway," she said in a firm tone. "What I was thinking is that we make a deal. You don't kick me, and I won't take away your blankets and leave you to die a cold, horrible death."

"Wait, we do all that in our sleep," he said, sounding sort of confused. "Doesn't that mean we can't help doing it?"

It was now or never. Inhaling sharply, she reached out and grabbed his shirt. "If we... tangle up, maybe we won't untangle and do our normal stuff."

His teeth flashed, even in the darkness. "Casey McDonald, are you offering to _spoon_ with me?"

"_No_," she said through gritted teeth. "I am merely attempting to approach this in a rational, reasonable--"

Laughing, he wrapped his arms around her and tugged. "Well, I'd hate to freeze to death," he said, breath hot on her neck.

She closed her eyes. Even though she was warm and relatively comfortable, and Derek's breathing soon evened out as he drifted off, sleep did not come to her that night. She refused to consider why.

* * *

"This is pointless..." Derek moaned.

"Shut up," she said through gritted teeth.

He poked at her with a wrapped finger -- this universe hadn't learned about gloves, apparently, so they'd been forced to rip up a shirt and use it to shield their hands from the cold. "Seriously. I mean, _you're_ the one who always bitches about losing all of the arrows."

"I haven't lost one today, have I?" she countered.

"Yet," he grumbled, prodding her again.

But something moved into her line of sight and she returned his prod with a sharp nudge. "I need to concentrate," she hissed, focusing all of her attention on the animal on the other side of the bushes.

It was possible that he said something, but she'd tuned him out completely.

Right now, there were only two things in her universe: her arrow and the furry creature that looked like a cross between Bambi and a teddy bear that was standing in the clearing, nibbling on an evergreen tree.

A movement to her left told her Derek was definitely trying to get her attention, but that was so unimportant she didn't even bother to tell him to stop it.

Her will was in balance with her need. Just like Magic Man said. Casey took even breaths, staring at the Bambi bear's forehead.

With a steady hand, she drew back her bowstring and let her arrow fly.

"...never hit anything before," Derek said loudly, abruptly coming back into focus. "Whoa!"

"Got it," she said, satisfied. "Come on." She pushed her way through the branches and started walking toward her kill, but when she glanced back, he was still standing there with a dumbfounded expression on his face.

"But you..." he stammered with a wild-eyed look, "you just..."

Casey put an impatient hand on her hip. "You have to help me, Derek. Now, _come on_."

"How the hell did you _do_ that?" he asked as he climbed out of the bushes. "You can't hit the broad side of a barn."

That stung a little, but she wasn't going to let him take the wind out of her sails today. "Magic Man said that since I used my magic to hit the knight before, I could probably do it again if I wanted to. Although _someone_ was kind of making it hard for me to focus."

As they approached the carcass, Derek paled. "Oh, jeez, you shot it in the head," he said, sounding disgusted.

She pulled her knife out of her pocket. "Help me get its legs -- you need to hold it upside down."

"It's like a smelly Care Bear," he said, grabbing the back legs and hoisting them into the air. "You're not actually going to make me eat this thing, are you? It looks like it ought to be named Fluffy and have a ribbon around its neck."

"Well," she grunted, slashing the animal's throat and letting the blood drain onto the snow. "Your alternative is exactly half a piece of jerky and one of those raisin-looking things."

He turned green at the sight of the blood. "What did you do that for?" he asked, gagging on the words.

"Meat's not edible if there's blood in it," she said. "Keep holding it like that -- I need to skin it."

His hands twitched, but to his credit, his expression stayed pretty calm. "I know I've asked before, but where the hell did you learn to do all this weird stuff, Casey?"

What harm could it really do to tell him? "Summer camp," she said with a bitter laugh.

"No way," he replied. "You were only, like, nine or something. They don't teach that kind of shit to nine-year-olds."

"They do when they're psychotic ex-military men who are convinced that the camp is going to be attacked by the Viet Cong," she said shortly, slipping the blade of the knife under the animal's skin and yanking.

"Dude..." he said in an admiring voice. "No kidding?"

The carcass slid out of its skin by degrees, and Casey impatiently cracked the joints so that only the torso came free. As much as she hated to be wasteful, that was all they could reasonably carry. The bloody muscle felt awful, but she wasn't about to let Derek know that she was just as horrified by what she was doing as he was.

"They fired him when they found out how batshit crazy he was," she said, mostly to distract herself from the task at hand. "But if he hadn't been, we'd be stranded out here with no idea how to do any of that kind of stuff."

"I can't decide whether or not that would be better," Derek replied, staring at the meat in her hands. "Do... do you need help with that?"

She took mercy on him. "Nah, I got it."

* * *

"I have to admit, Casey," he said, chewing as he spoke, "roasted Care Bear isn't half bad."

"Could you _please_ stop calling it that?" she asked, rolling her eyes. "It's bad enough that I had to kill it."

Now that the meat had been skinned and cooked, Derek appeared to be much more casual about the whole thing. "Come on. It's the circle of life, Case. Didn't you see _Bambi_ as a kid?"

"Says the boy who practically threw up as he just watched me skin it," she said sarcastically. "How can you be so flip about it now?"

He shrugged. "Just because I don't want to know exactly which animal my supper comes from doesn't mean that I don't get that meat comes from killing stuff."

"Then you get to do it next time," she said pointedly. "I'll even show you how to butcher and dress it, if you want."

"Now why would I do that?" he asked with a grin. "You're the hunting expert, princess. I mean, you've even got the magical archery powers; how can I possibly compare?"

Shaking her head, she fed a few twigs into the fire. "Flattery doesn't work when it's bullshit, Derek. Even _you_ should know that."

Something rustled in the bushes, but both of them ignored it. Magic Man had been right when he told them that they were heading out into the middle of nowhere; no one was going to bother them all the way out here.

"Maybe I was being serious," he said. "Well, sort of," he amended when she shot him a disbelieving look. "But you have to admit, Case, I'm good when we're in town, but out here, I'm crap at stuff. I can carry my bag and walk in the snow while you go all deerstalker or whatever, but that's basically it."

"Oh, come on, Derek," she said. "That's not... true." But even as she spoke, she realized that she wasn't telling the truth.

He grinned. "You suck at lying, Case. But don't think I don't appreciate the effort."

"Shut up," she retorted, blushing bright red. "I'm not good at any of it."

"I'll deny ever saying this, but you're better at it than I am," he said, poking at the fire with a particularly long stick. "Just at this _one_ thing. You can be good at outdoor stuff, and I'll keep kicking your ass at everything else."

"As long as you're so modest about it," she told him with a wry twist of her lips. "I've always found humility to be one of your more appealing character traits."

Abandoning the stick to the flames, he pointed triumphantly at her. "Aha!" he exclaimed. "So you _do_ think I have appealing character traits!"

"Sarcasm, Venturi," she replied condescendingly. "I know you're intimately familiar with it."

A wide smirk crossed his face. "You said _intimate_," he said in a teasing voice.

"What are you? _Four_?"

Another rustle cut off his retort, this one too loud to ignore.

"Probably just a rabbit or whatever they call rabbit-esque things around here," he instead said calmly.

"Yeah," she agreed, not believing it for an instant. Rabbit-sized things didn't make _that_ much noise.

His hand twitched. "We know it's not a person, though. There's no one for miles. And it's not really all that weird that an animal would be attracted to the smell of cooking meat."

"Sure." One-word answers were good; she could control her sudden and irrational fear a little better if she knew she didn't have to talk much.

The twitching hand came to rest on the hilt of his sword, and Casey wondered when he'd started wearing it again; somehow, she hadn't noticed until now. "Maybe I should..."

"Don't," she said quickly. "If it's an animal, maybe it'll just go away."

The fire popped and both of them flinched.

Derek laughed nervously. "We're both being stupid, you know."

This time they could actually see the branches _move_, and they froze in place.

What happened next, Casey remembered only in hazy slow motion.

Something hairy and _enormous_ coming out of the trees and lunging toward their little camp.

Derek pulling out his sword and yelling at her to get her bow.

A hard paw on her back as she fumbled through her bag, claws ripping her shirt.

Derek shouting her name.

The paw flinging her through the air.

Rolling. Rolling through the snow, pain when her bleeding back made contact with the ground.

Falling and screaming and grabbing at _anything_.

Derek's name in her voice when it occurred to her that he was up there alone with... that thing.

And then darkness.

* * *

The only reason she woke up at all was because Derek wouldn't let her sleep. She was warm and comfortable and he had to go and yell...

Wait. She wasn't warm and she _definitely_ wasn't comfortable.

Her eyes opened to dim moonlight and she saw that when she'd fallen off the cliff--

_Cliff_?

When she'd fallen, she'd managed to get wedged on a tree root. Which probably saved her life. She chanced a glance down into the gorge and almost passed out again.

But Derek was still shouting at her.

"I'm fine," she called up to him in a rusty voice.

"I thought you were dead," he said. Or that's what she thought he said, anyway. Everything was kind of fuzzy -- maybe she hit her head during the fall.

"Why were you shouting at me if you thought I was dead?" she asked, genuinely confused.

"Jesus, Casey," he said. "Can you reach my hand?"

She shook her head and then realized how stupid that was. "I can't even _see_ it," she said.

After another few minutes, something hit her in the face. "Grab on," Derek said. "I'll pull you up."

It was a rope. He'd tied a loop at the end, big enough for her to get both her hands through. She settled for just one, though, pulling at the knot so her wrist was secured. If she slipped, her shoulder would be dislocated, but at least she probably wouldn't fall to her death. "Got it," she called.

"Okay," he said, and the rope went taut.

She was going to be stuck down in this hole forever. Derek was obviously working hard, but she was only moving inches. She wasn't finding many footholds, and her arms were getting tired quickly. "Derek..." she gasped.

"Just a little bit more, Case," he said.

"Liar," she wheezed, looking up at the impossible expanse of rock between her feet and safety. "My arms..."

"Don't think about it," he told her firmly. "Just keep walking."

Twenty eternities passed, and Casey was sure she was going to fall to her death at any second as she practically crawled up the cliff. In the instant before the muscles in her arms failed completely, she felt hands go around her waist and tug her back over the edge.

"Fuck," Derek muttered, pulling her back to camp.

His face was white. Why was he so pale? He didn't look injured.

"Derek..." she whispered. She needed to sit down -- her arms and legs were going to give out the instant he let her go.

"I'm sorry, Casey," he gasped. "You were... and I couldn't... and _shit_, Casey."

Baffled, she could only gape at him. "What?"

"You were almost killed," he said, still hanging onto her waist.

All she could think of saying was, "But I wasn't."

"Too close," he mumbled, shaking his head. "You were too close."

And then she was pressed against him and his mouth was on hers and she forgot that she was dizzy and she was going to shatter into a million pieces because Derek Venturi was _kissing_ her.

Before she could even think of doing anything else, her mouth slipped open and her arms curled around his shoulders. Derek Venturi was kissing her -- what else could she do?

His hands were in her hair, his lips moved on hers, and she honest-to-God _moaned_.

It was like a switch flipped and they were back to reality.

She tore away from him and almost fell into the fire for her efforts.

Blinking, Derek just stared at her, his eyes full of emotion that she didn't understand and was _definitely_ not going to ask about.

Her mouth formed around the word _no_, and he spun on a heel and vanished into the forest without a sound.

Casey finally allowed herself to collapse in the snow and hurt in earnest. Her lips tingled from their kiss, and she traced over them with a single finger.

What the _fuck_ were they going to do now?

* * *

Actual A/N: Fear not... I have no intention of not updating for three weeks. I have a bit of a break in my schedule and therefore more time for writing -- I wouldn't have left it in a place like that otherwise :)

* * *


	10. And Had More Fun Than Originally Planned

A/N: Warning! If you are diabetic, you may need an insulin shot before viewing this chapter. I'm just sayin'...  
Also, I do not share Derek's opinion of _Last of the Mohicans_ but do highly recommend that anyone with a romantic bone in their body watch it.

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Ten: And Had More Fun Than Originally Planned

"Stupid Casey," he muttered to himself. It felt good, so he said it again. "Stupid Casey. All _her_ fault."

And it totally was. If she hadn't _turned her back_ on a raging beast, it wouldn't have clawed her and thrown her over a cliff, and none of... what happened later would have happened.

Besides, he got the thing, didn't he? Or, at least, he chased it around the camp and hurt it bad enough with his sword that it disappeared back into the forest, trailing blood in its wake.

That's what he was doing right now -- following the trail. If that animal was still alive, he had every intention of killing it.

Because he'd been lying earlier. If Casey could go all _Last of the Mohicans_ out here, then so could he. It couldn't be all that hard if she could do it. Besides, how sweet would that be? He always thought those three guys were awesome; especially that one with the really sharp axe thing. Man, he could kick some serious ass.

What a great movie. He could always get girls to watch it with him because they thought it was _romantic_. It was like his own little joke; they all missed the whole point of the movie. The old guy at the end, standing on his own and watching everything he knew fading away in a cloud of gunsmoke. It was gory and depressing and one of the best movies ever made. But every girl he'd ever watched it with had just sighed over all the damn kissing scenes and never got what it was really about.

He wondered if Casey had ever seen it, but his brain wisely refused to pursue that thought. Dangerous territory, Casey and kissing movies.

The trail was getting harder to follow, with more space between the spots of blood staining the snow. Derek didn't know if that was a good sign or not.

But what it turned out to mean was that over the next hill, he found the animal collapsed in a big, motionless heap.

Now that it wasn't trying to eat him, he could get a better look at it. It sort of looked like a grizzly bear, but its fur was shaggier and its teeth were longer, jutting out of its mouth. Whatever it was, it had probably gotten tired of its usual Care Bear diet and wanted to branch out to more exotic cuisines.

A flash of an old conversation streaked through his mind as he stared down at the thing.

_"... I happen to be a master bear-slayer."_

_"Oh, really? Well, what about the lions and tigers?"_

_"You're on your own there, Case..."_

He shook his head. "Some fucking bear-slayer _I_ turned out to be."

Spying a fist-sized rock near his foot, he snatched it up and hurled it at the beast's head. It bounced off with a horrific squelching noise, and that's when he knew it was really dead.

For an instant, he debated whether or not he ought to try his hand at some of that butchering stuff Casey had been swaggering about earlier, but at the end of everything, it felt a little too... savage to eat something that had tried to eat them less than two hours ago.

So he left it lying where it was and started walking back to camp. Maybe by the time he got back, Casey would be done being a stupid _girl_ and, well...

The fact that he couldn't finish that sentence even in his head probably didn't mean anything significant.

* * *

Actually, the first thing that he saw as he climbed out of the bushes was Casey sitting near the fire, not wearing a shirt.

That was heinously unfair, damn it.

He was pretty sure her lips were moving and words were coming out, but all he could do was look at the smooth, pale skin of her stomach and wonder what she would do if he...

No. Not going there. No, no, no.

And yet, he couldn't tear his eyes away. Just once, he could...

A hand was under his chin, jerking his whole head forward. He blinked and found himself looking into a pair of _very_ angry eyes. "For Christ's sake, Derek, don't act like you haven't seen a girl in a bra before," Casey snapped.

Anything he could've said would only have made it worse.

"I need you to help me," she said firmly.

Help he could do. Within reason. "Yeah?" he asked in a cautious voice.

In response, she just turned around and showed him _why_ she wasn't wearing a shirt.

"Shit, Case," he whispered, sucking a breath in through his teeth.

"Whatever smartass comments you want to make, I feel like I should warn you that I'm exhausted and in a lot of pain and therefore do not take any responsibility for my subsequent behavior," she said.

He spread a hand over the bloody mess on her back, careful not to come in contact with the wounds. "I wasn't actually going to say anything."

She snorted but didn't reply.

"Do... what do we have to clean this up?" he asked softly.

"I don't know how bad it is, but..."

_Oh, it's bad_. But he didn't say it out loud.

"...wash everything out using snow and then use _this_." She pushed some shreds of cloth into his hands.

"You tore up another one of your shirts," he said, looking down at the fabric. "Casey, you can't just--"

"Don't you dare, Derek," she interrupted, twisting her head around to glare at him. "My shirt, my choice. If you'd go ahead and start, I'm kind of exposed to the elements here."

It clicked and he dragged her over to the fire, situating her as close as he dared to the warmth. He tried to be gentle as he used handfuls of snow to wipe the blood and dirt out of the deep gashes on her back, but her hands clenched into white-knuckled fists and she kept making little hissing noises of pain. At one point, he _almost_ asked if she was okay, but the answer was pretty obvious, really.

Wrapping the makeshift bandages around her posed something of a challenge, but he figured out how to tuck them around without tying too many knots. "These probably need stitches," he said conversationally as he worked. "You're gonna get some great scars, Case."

"Yeah, well, someone told me once that chicks dig scars," she replied with a bitter laugh.

Unconsciously, a hand went up to his own cheek. The scab had fallen off days ago, but the wound had been reopened so many times that he was sure it looked awful. Casey had never said anything about it, though. "It's true," he said lightly. "They're going to be all over you, Spacey, with beauties like these."

"Oh, good," she said. "Because with everything that's happened, my one great fear has been that I wouldn't be able to score chicks any more."

He couldn't help it -- he laughed. After all this time, he finally had definitive proof that Casey could be funny when she wanted to be. "Well, I think that's about as good as it's going to get," he said, smoothing a hand over her bandages, careful not to touch any of her skin at _all_.

Before she could move, he slipped over to his pack and pulled out a shirt, handing it to her with as casual an air as he could manage.

"What's that?" she asked disdainfully.

"Wow, Case, you must have hit your head harder than I thought. This," he said in his best imitation of his old kindergarten teacher, "is a _shirt_."

"It's _your_ shirt," she said with a pointed glare.

He shrugged and offered it to her again. "To be fair, it's just a shirt that happened to wind up in my bag. I've never worn it. In fact, we could pretend that we found it just now." He plastered an innocent wide-eyed expression on his face and began to mockingly examine the shirt in question. "Oh, I say, what is this curious item I have found? I do believe it is intended to be placed over the torso as a covering of sorts. What say you, strange, unclothed young woman?"

Rolling her eyes, she started to struggle to a standing position. "Derek, I don't need your stupid shirt."

"You keep ripping yours up, so I'd say that you do." They exchanged scowls for a few moments, and then Derek decided to settle it by playing dirty. "If you don't take it, I'll just wait for you to fall asleep and then redress you. That means I'll have to see you naked, _again_."

"De-rek!" she snapped. But she snatched the shirt out of his hands and pulled it awkwardly over her head. "Are you satisfied now?"

The sleeves flopped over her hands and kept hitting her in the face as she waved her hands in the air at him. "Immensely," he said, smirking. "Just quit shredding the rest of your clothes, Spacey, and I won't have to turn you into a Derek dress-up doll ever again."

"Oh, I've seen your version of dress-up plenty of times over the years," she said slyly. "You have no idea how to put on eyeshadow properly, by the way."

"Because the correct application of makeup been a life-long ambition of mine," he retorted. "In case it's completely escaped your notice, I'm a guy."

She pushed the sleeves up her arms and sighed when they just slipped right back down. "Much to my eternal chagrin."

"Not _eternal_," he said automatically.

Damn it.

Casey's head shot up, eyes wide and expression shocked, and Derek knew that he'd done something stupid.

And they'd been doing so well, too.

But there was no way around it now. They were going to have to... talk about it.

He sure as hell wasn't going to go first, though. He could wait Casey out as long as he needed to.

Which didn't turn out to be all that long, actually. "In my defense," she began with a nervous little laugh. "I'd just been hauled back over the edge of a cliff."

"And I'd just seen my one chance at getting back home tossed over the edge of the same cliff," he said.

"So, really," she concluded, "neither of us was fully aware of our actions."

He shook his head. "Nope. Trauma does weird things to people. Makes them behave irrationally."

"Post-traumatic stress..."

"Temporary insanity," he agreed.

She fidgeted with her shirt again, and the collar slipped to the side, leaving a shoulder bare. "Besides, it would be a complication."

"I don't like complications," he breathed, eyes glued to that shoulder.

"Neither do I," she said.

And that was it, really. Except that he couldn't stop staring at her, and she kept giving him a weird, unreadable look that he couldn't interpret for anything.

"Hey, Casey?" he asked, breaking the strange, stretched-out silence.

"What, Derek?" She sounded eerily calm.

"I... I, uh, think I ought to let you know that I'm about to--"

Whatever it was he was going to say, he had no chance of getting it out. In an instant, Casey launched herself at him in a flying tackle, pushing him back into the snow and kissing him as if her life depended on it.

Last time, he'd been scared and angry and barely remembered anything but her terrified eyes and whispered _no_, but this time...

He had snow in the seat of his pants and Casey's hips in his hands because touching her poor back was out of the question, but she touched him.

Hands on his face, shoulders, in his hair, and her mouth slipping from his to kiss his neck.

Which was nice but not... he dipped his head to capture her lips again, mind blanking out except for one desperate thought.

There was nothing that felt like this. Nothing, no one, _never_.

* * *

A single kiss could be blamed on anxiety and dementia, but a full-blown make-out session, well, that was a different matter. _He_ knew that, and he could only hope that Casey knew it too, otherwise this was not going to end well.

"This is a bad idea," she muttered between kisses.

It would have been sort of cute, except that it signaled the beginning of a _talk_, and Derek really, _really_ didn't want to have this conversation.

"Probably," he replied, brushing his mouth down her neck in a gesture deliberately designed to make her laugh. "I think my ass is frostbitten," he said as she giggled -- who knew he could actually make Casey _giggle_? "In the middle of a pile of snow? Not a great place to sit for half an hour, no matter what else is going on."

"Not what I meant," she said, cold fingers creeping under the hem of his shirt.

"Oh, I know," he said honestly, kissing her collarbone with enough pressure to leave a red mark. "I was just hoping to put off that conversation until I could feel my ass again."

Sighing, she withdrew and stood up, wincing as the wounds on her back obviously protested the movement. "Unlike you, I can take a hint."

It wasn't going to help a bit until he could actually get out of his wet clothes. "Ouch," he said jokingly, finding another pair of trousers in his bag and quickly changing. "You cut me to the quick."

"Is _that_ what kids these days are calling it?" she asked, quirking an eyebrow.

He gave her a delighted smile. "Casey, did you just make a dirty joke?"

No answer, but her expression had something... sparkly about it.

"I mean, it was kind of lame, but a start's a start, right?"

She just rolled her eyes. "How's your ass?"

"As awe-inspiring as ever," he said, shooting her his best 'flirty grin.' He'd lost his mind. He really had. "And thankfully much closer to a normal temperature." He dropped down on a pile of blankets near the fire. "You were saying that this was a bad idea?"

"Derek..." She looked down at her feet, which wasn't a good sign. "I don't think I can have this conversation if you're just going to make jokes the whole time."

Wow... that was unusually direct for her. Well, one good deed deserved another, he supposed. "Sure," he said. "I can deal with that."

"I meant it when I said that this makes stuff complicated," she said, sitting beside him on the blankets and holding her hands out toward the fire. "What's going to happen when we get back?"

"We're going to have to explain where we went for four months," he said flatly. "I don't think their biggest concern is going to be that I know you like orange underwear."

She glared at him, but it was obviously half-hearted. "Derek..."

"I get it," he said. "I do, Case. But... when is shit _not_ complicated?"

"I just don't know if it's worth all the trouble." She wouldn't look at him; all he could see was the curve of her cheek as she gazed into the flickering flames.

He remembered waking up with her hair up his nose and her cold feet pressed against his shins and knew that it was. "Okay..." he said uncomfortably.

Finally, she did look up at him. Her nose was wrinkled and she was smirking. "Bullshit," she countered.

Letting out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding in, he didn't bother to hide his relief. "So is the horrible conversation we've both been dreading over?"

"It was surprisingly short," she said, face relaxing into a smile. "But I bet there's a 'to be continued' tacked in somewhere."

"Not if I can help it," he said, meaning it. "I'm good, if you are."

"Mostly, I'm sleepy," she admitted, and for the first time, he noticed the shadows under her eyes. "And I hurt like a..."

If he thought much about it, her scream as she plummeted off the cliff's edge was still echoing in his ears. He needed to do something about that. "Casey, I know shit got all... different really fast, but I'm... I'm sorry about what happened."

"Derek, it's not your fault," she said earnestly. "Stuff happens that's beyond your control sometimes. And I'm okay."

All things he'd told himself earlier, but coming from her, they all rang false. "I just want you to be safe," he said, and it felt like the biggest confession he'd ever made.

"Why the hell do you think I got so scared that day you went in the fighting ring?" she asked, frowning.

"Yeah, but that was..." And then his brain caught up with his mouth and he couldn't help letting the biggest, dumbest grin in all of creation spread across his face. "You mean...?"

Her face was red, but she wasn't close enough to the fire for it to be from the heat. "I'm not repeating it," she said firmly. "You snooze, you lose, buddy."

"Fair enough," he said, slowly easing his hands into a much more strategic position. "I just want you to know that I _did_ warn you."

"Warn me?" she echoed. "About what?"

He laughed. "_This_," he said, tickling her mercilessly.

Shrieking in a pretty fair imitation of Marti, Casey alternated between punching him and begging him to stop. "I'll... I'll _kill_ you!" she choked out amid helpless laughter.

"Nah," he said, smoothing his hands down her sides. "You've already admitted that you care whether I live or die. Your threats are meaningless, McDonald; might as well give up now."

"Are we going to turn into _those_ people because of all this?" she asked, still panting a little. "You know," she continued when he shot her a confused look, "those horrible cutesy people that no one can stand to be around because they're so wrapped up in themselves?"

With a tilt of the head, he gave it some serious thought. "Maybe. In fact, I feel pretty nauseous right now. Hey, Spacey, that means you make me sick -- we're probably pretty safe from all that cutesy crap, then, huh?"

"Alternately," she said thoughtfully, more to herself than to him, "I could be completely wrong about this whole thing and you really _are_ just as disgusting and immature as I've always secretly suspected."

"Secretly?" he asked with a skeptical eyebrow. "You mean you were hiding the depth of your feelings for me? Boy, I'm really flattered, Case."

She huffed impatiently. "Or something. You're going to deliberately misinterpret everything I say from now on, aren't you?"

"Pretty much," he agreed gleefully. "But what makes you think I haven't been doing that since we met?"

Nudging him with a gentle elbow, she just sighed again. "Derek, I'm seriously exhausted. Can't we call it a night? You can be just as obnoxious tomorrow, can't you?"

"More spooning, Case? You're insatiable, young lady." But those dark circles were starting to bug him, and he knew she was hurting bad, so even as he spoke he was rearranging the blankets.

As they lay down, Casey stretched out on her belly, resting her cheek on her hand and giving him a look he couldn't quite decipher. "Derek?"

He turned on his side, and his hand somehow moved of its own accord to curl around her hip again. "Yeah?"

"I really am okay, you know. Just in case it mattered," she whispered.

"Good," he said, because it did, sort of.

As he came closer, one of her hands slipped across his chest, coming to rest on his shoulder. And he rolled, taking her with him so that she was halfway draped over him. Her solid weight was warm and comforting, and he said it again because it needed saying. "Good."

* * *

"I spy with my little eye something... _white_."

"Oh, come _on_," Casey moaned. "Actually pick something for once."

She'd promised him this would be _fun_, and he'd stupidly believed her. He forgot that her version of fun usually included color-coded charts and activities with detailed 'dos and don'ts' lists. "I said I'd play, didn't I?" he retorted irritably. "So I spy something white. Figure it out, champ."

"Gee, could it be _snow_?" she asked, waving her hand at the flat expanse surrounding them. "Is there a particular snowflake you're focused on?"

He grinned. The game was awful, but messing with her was turning out to be kind of entertaining. "Nope. Not snow. You said I couldn't pick snow again."

"Derek, you've picked snow seven times in a row. Three of those seven times, you swore up and down that it wasn't snow, and then it turned out to be snow anyway," she said, sighing.

"Well, I promise, then. Did I _promise_ any of those other times?" he countered.

She folded her arms across her chest. "Twice."

"Oh." The wind went out of his sails, but only briefly. "Is there anything I can do to make you believe me?"

"No, but if it turns out to be snow again, I'll figure out something really horrible to do to you," she said with a smirk. "And no one will be naked," she continued quickly as his mouth opened. "At least, not in a fun way."

"Come on, Case, how many _un_-fun ways could there possibly be to be naked?" he teased.

She furrowed her brow for a second. "Facedown in the snow while the girl of your dreams stands nearby, laughing her ass off and eating all of your raisins," she said promptly.

"It bothers me how quickly you came up with that," he said, grimacing. "Also, what the hell makes you think you're the girl of my dreams?"

Hands spread wide in an inviting gesture, she just shrugged a little. "You see any other takers, Derek?"

"Touche. So, about this white thing that I spy..."

"Animal?" she asked with a resigned sigh.

"Nope."

"Vegetable?"

He laughed. "You're never going to get it with dumb questions like that."

"Is it _really_ white?" Her voice was irritated.

"That's a girl," he said, ducking the swipe she took at his head. "And the answer is: no."

"Is it another color?"

Well, he had to admit that when she caught on, she _really_ caught on. "No."

She smiled. "So it's clear."

"Excuse me, young lady, was that a question?" he asked in a playful tone.

"Is it on the ground?" she asked, rolling her eyes at him.

"No. Good try, though."

"Aha!" she exclaimed triumphantly. "Is it in a _tree_?"

Who would have thought that such a lame-ass game could be this close to fun? "Nope," he said cheerfully.

She actually stopped walking and stared at the landscape. "Huh... is it made by an animal?"

"What?" he asked, wondering what the hell she thought he was looking at. "No!"

"Does it sparkle?" There was a desperate note in her voice.

Back on track, then. "Yeah, it does. And correct me if I'm wrong, Case, but you've only got two questions left." She glared at him and he held his hands up defensively. "_You're_ the one who said that twenty whole questions would be too easy."

"Is it the stone on the hilt of your sword?" she asked.

He pulled the sword out of its sheath and looked at it closely. "Wow, there really _is_ a stone set on the handle," he said. "I never noticed."

She wilted visibly. "And it's not snow?"

"You give up?" he asked with a devilish grin.

"I'm out of questions, aren't I?"

Reaching toward her, he plucked an icicle out of her hair. "I've been staring at this thing on the back of your head for, like, the last hour. I guess it got there when we had to walk through those trees."

"You..." Her hands were making weird twisting motions in the air. "You said it wasn't snow!"

"Technically, Casey, this is ice," he said, still grinning as he waved the icicle under her nose. "Not snow."

Her mouth fell open, and he chuckled as he realized that he'd managed to stun her into silence.

Pretty sweet. Didn't last long, though. "I can't believe you, Venturi," she growled.

"You're just mad because I'm better at _I Spy_ than you are," he taunted, holding up the icicle again. "It's your turn, you know."

"It's my..." she trailed off with an incredulous expression on her face. "I'm gonna..."

There was a strangely fast blur as her hand cut through the air and something flew toward his face.

Where the hell did she get enough snow to make a snowball without him noticing? He never even saw her bend down.

It smacked him in the nose, exploding ice in pretty much every orifice he had up there -- nose, ears, mouth, even his _eyes_ stung.

She grinned as he wiped at his face. "I won," she said happily.

"You can't just _declare_ yourself the winner," he said, spitting out snow as he spoke. "That was one snowball. One snowball does not a fight make, Case."

"Says who?" she asked.

"Casey, Casey, Casey," he said, shaking his head with mock-sorrow. "You're pretty good, but your plan has a fatal flaw in its execution."

"Oh, really?" she shot back. "I thought it worked pretty well. Throw snowball at Derek and hit him in the face. The end."

A corner of his mouth curled up into a smirk. "It's the same mistake that all the supervillains make."

"So I'm a supervillain?" she asked curiously. "For someone who's recently started claiming not to despise me, you're sure not much for compliments, are you?"

"You're monologuing, princess," he said, waving a finger at her.

"You totally just made that word up," she accused.

Oh, this was going to be _awesome_. "No, I didn't," he said. "You were tricked into taking the time to detail your nefarious plan--"

"Because five seconds of me talking is going to make _such_ a difference..."

"Thereby allowing the good guy to come up with a daring plan of his own. Head's up, Case!" he shouted, flinging his own snowball at her.

Okay, so maybe she managed to duck it, but there was a glint in her eyes that told him it was going to be worth it. "Oh, it's on, Captain Venturi," she cried, dashing behind a tree, gathering up a couple of handfuls of snow on her way.

This was _so_ much more fun than that idiotic spying game.

* * *

"Don't be stupid about this, Casey," he said, switching tactics. Looking beseeching wasn't doing anything, and it wasn't like he was going to apologize, anyway.

With a sniff, she dumped some wood on the fire.

"Look, it was a game. And it's like you said before; I'm super competitive and I... get carried away sometimes," he explained.

She gave him a skeptical look.

Well, that was progress. Sort of. Thirty minutes ago, she refused to look at him at all.

"If I could do it all over again, I would do it differently," he said honestly.

Because dumping snow down her shirt to see her expression of horror was so not worth the ensuing shit-storm. He knew that now.

It wasn't working.

"Although," he said, now trying out his best set of seductive tones, "what I did has had some pretty nice consequences. You in another one of my shirts, for instance. Pretty hot stuff."

She still didn't say anything, but '_are you serious_?' was written all over her face.

"Yeah, okay," he admitted, "not my best work. But I'm trying, Casey. I didn't mean to." After a pause, he amended that. "I didn't mean to piss you off. Hey, how about I let you do something awful to me? That naked, facedown in the snow thing sounded pretty bad."

More wood on the fire. Possibly a frustrated sigh, but that could have meant lots of things.

"And you can have all of my raisins," he said. "I know you like them better than I do anyway."

It occurred to him that he was babbling and that was _stupid_. Derek Venturi didn't _do_ babbling. At least, not because of any old girl.

She deserved a fair warning, at least. "Casey, I hate to do this, but you brought it on yourself," he said solemnly.

Her brow furrowed and her mouth opened. "Derek..."

Too little, too late. Before she could say another word, he pulled her forward in a bruising kiss, allowing his hands to mostly go wherever the hell they wanted. The back was off-limits, though, even in his haze, because she still winced every time she had to twist around for something.

For a second, she stiffened under his touch, but only for a second. Then she was kissing him back, and Derek was wondering if it counted as an apology if he was enjoying it _too_.

With a whispery little sigh, she leaned into him, and only then did it really register that his hands had apparently wanted to skip a whole bunch of preliminaries and figure out once and for all whether the skin just beneath the waistband of her trousers was actually as soft as it looked.

It was, and he had the sudden and overwhelming urge to touch as much of it as she'd let him.

Which was why it was so frustrating when she broke off their kiss to give him a very serious look. "I forgive you," she said, taking his face in her hands.

Forgive him? For _what_? It came back to him slowly. Even more slowly once he leaned forward and started kissing his way down her neck. By the time his mouth reached the place where her neck met her shoulder, he'd forgotten again.

_So_ much better than the babbling. And it worked, too.

* * *

"You know," he began thoughtfully, "I think I'm starting to hate this place a little less."

She rolled her eyes. "Oh, gee, I wonder why..."

Grinning, he gave her a playful nudge. "Sure, you're all sarcastic now, but last night, you--"

"De-rek!" she interrupted with a deep blush.

"What? Afraid of offending the local Care Bear population?" he asked.

"It's the principle," she said primly. "Besides, you're acting like we... but we stopped before anything actually..." Trailing off, she blushed again.

He snorted but didn't say anything.

With a glare, she stopped walking and put her hands on her hips. "Do you have something to say, Derek?"

No way he was falling for that one; some things just weren't worth it. "Nuh-uh," he said, shaking his head emphatically. "No naughty talk for Casey. Got it."

"Dear Diary," Casey said in an overly girly voice, folding her hands over her heart. "Today the most extraordinary thing happened! For the first time in documented history, Derek failed to pick a fight over nothing with me when given an opening. What can this possibly _mean_? Dare I hope that my fondest--"

"Yeah, yeah," he said irritably, cutting her off, "you're a laugh riot and I think you're a raving lunatic. Satisfied?"

"And the natural order has been restored," she replied, starting to walk again.

Adjusting his bag on his shoulders, he trotted after her. "I take back what I said about this place not sucking," he told her. "If you're going to be all mean for no good reason, I can't _wait_ to get back home. Hey, how do we know we're going the right way?"

"Magic Man told me how to get there, remember?" she chided him. "We're going north."

So his suspicion was right, then. "But we're not," he said. "We haven't been, not for days."

And she stopped again, spinning around to give him one of those wide-eyed anxious stares that told him something was seriously up and she was about to lie to him. "How do you know which way we're going?" she asked quietly.

"It's not hard," he said with a shrug. "Once that old Keeper dude told us which way was which, anyway. It's called a sense of direction, Case -- those who can't, buy maps. I've been keeping track in my head the whole time, just in case we needed to get back to the town."

Her eyes widened even more. "So you know where we are?"

"If we walk for six days... that way..." He pointed. "We'd get back to Magic Man's house. Why?"

Here came the lie. "Oh, no reason," she said lightly. "I thought you said you weren't a Boy Scout, Derek. You've been holding out on me."

"Come on," he said, letting it pass, "can you picture me putting up with those stupid socks and neck things for more than, like, two seconds?"

She chattered on about Boy Scouts and compasses, but Derek tuned most of it out. For some reason, she wasn't telling the truth about where they were going, and the more he thought about it, the more it bothered him. There wasn't a lot of sense in confronting her right now, though. She'd just get mad and clam up even more.

So he'd bide his time. For now.

* * *


	11. And Eventually Even Found the Island

A/N: Just a reminder that I'm _really_ busy in RL. I update when I can, and I know it's frustratingly slow, but there's nothing I can do to speed it up. The good news about that is there are only two chapters left, so it won't be long before this puppy is finished :) Having said that, thanks for reading!  
Oh, and I forgot to mention that the Chuck Norris film mentioned is, in fact, _Sidekicks_, which I remember watching a _lot_ during the 90's (thanks, Catdogg!!)

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Eleven: And Eventually Even Found the Island

Casey had to admit that whoever first came up with the idea to lure a naked girl into his sleeping bag with that dumbass line about sharing maximum body heat might have had a point.

Now, granted, she and Derek weren't _entirely_ naked, but there was definite skin-on-skin interaction going on, and she felt decidedly warmer right now than she had in mornings past.

And wasn't that just the weirdest, most surreal thing ever? A week ago, she would have said that falling through the hedge-door and winding up in another universe topped her list of "Ten Strangest Things Ever Happening To Casey." But the fact that she had swapped spit with Derek Venturi not just once but _multiple_ times over the last five days had the door thing beat by a mile.

Even more bizarre, though, was the startling realization that she wanted to do it again. And again. As many times as he would let her, really.

Without it becoming complicated.

Because she didn't need complicated. She'd done complicated so many times by this point -- three times was a lot, right? -- that she didn't want to deal with that sort of thing ever again. She'd been told, "It's _complicated_, Casey," over and over by way too many people. Sam, Max, Noel, that random guy she'd awkwardly asked to the Sadie Hawkins dance last year in a desperate last-ditch effort to get back on the relationship horse. Even her own _mother_ pulled out the Complication Card now and again.

She didn't want to hear that phrase coming out of Derek's mouth _ever_. The good thing was, she was pretty sure she wouldn't. At least, not given what she knew about him.

What she was currently choosing not to think about was the likely fact that the reason she wouldn't ever hear Derek explaining why everything had suddenly become so complicated was because he would probably just start ignoring her instead until she got fed up and left him alone.

Really, that was beside the point. Sort of putting the cart before the horse or some other grandmotherly saying.

Much better to take her own advice, ignore all the potential complications, and marvel over the fact that Derek's chest was covered with a thin and strangely appealing layer of hair. It trailed down his torso and below the waist of his pants, all but inviting her to explore. She traced her finger down the line, dipping...

"That tickles," Derek muttered, his hand snaking out to snatch her wrist away. "Besides," he continued, eyes still closed, "you shouldn't start something you don't intend to finish, princess."

"What makes you think I wasn't going to follow through?" she countered smartly.

One eye cracked open. "Are you _serious_?"

She grinned at him. "What do you think, _D-man_?"

"I think we both are keenly aware of how much we stink," he said with a groan, starting to sit up.

"Don't!" she said, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and trying to pull him back to the ground. "You'll let the cold air in."

"Can't stay here all day," he replied. "I don't like how the clouds look this morning."

"At least let me put on my shirt first," she grumbled, fumbling in the blankets in an effort to find some of her clothes. "What happened to you being cold all the time?"

Shrugging, he untangled himself from their makeshift bed and stood up. "Dunno," he said as he took his shirt from her and pulled it over his head. "I got used to it, I guess."

She allowed herself a ten-second count to finish savoring the warmth before pushing herself to her feet and starting to fold up the blankets. "Do you want to start a fire? We can roast a couple of those apple-tasting things Magic Man put in our bags."

"How many do we have left?" he asked, holding his bag open while Casey shoved the blankets in. "I didn't think we had any."

"There are still about half-a-dozen, I think," she said, grunting as she forced the corners of the last blanket deep into the pack. "The waterskins are almost empty, too."

"I can try to get the fire going again," he said with only a small sigh. "We probably should save the matches, unless you know something about getting snow-covered wood to start that I don't." He gave the ashes a poke, looking for a sign that the embers hadn't gone out completely.

Casey looked up at the clouds; it was best if she didn't watch him struggle with the fire. There was something in his stance that told her today would be a bad day to pick a fight. "It's awfully dark this morning," she said thoughtfully.

"I don't think it's morning," he told her, not looking up from his task. "It's been light for a long time, but I didn't want to wake you up."

She quickly opened her mouth to admonish him but closed it equally quickly. After a long pause, she decided to just let it go. "How late do you think it is?"

"Early afternoon, maybe? It took you a long time to fall asleep last night," he said. "Damn it, I think the fire's out."

"The scabs on my back are itching pretty bad," she admitted in an effort to offer him a subtle apology. "Sorry if I did a lot of tossing and turning."

Growling, he kicked snow over the remains of their fire. "Guess it's jerky and snow for breakfast again," he sighed. "Do you want me to look at your bandages before we get started?"

"Let's just assume that itching is a good thing," she replied hastily. Both of them knew that her back was not healing well, but there wasn't really anything they could do about it.

"As long as they don't open up again," he said in an unconcerned voice that let her know just how worried he really was. "You don't know how glad I am that the thing on my face finally got a chance to heal. Every time it broke open, it was like getting cut up all over again."

"Probably because every time it broke open, you were getting punched in the face," she countered, unable to help herself. "Jerky?"

He took the strip from her hand and started chewing it morosely. "Remember when this stuff actually tasted _good_?"

With a snort, she took a bite of her own jerky. "The novelty of outdoor life has definitely worn off."

Finishing up his meal,' Derek picked up both bags and slung them over his shoulders -- she'd given up trying to talk him into letting her carry one despite her injuries a few days ago. "Ready to blow this pop stand?"

"Really? And I thought this place was so great that we ought to build a vacation home here," she drawled sarcastically.

"Careful, young lady," he said in a grave tone, waggling a finger at her. "That was perilously close to a negative comment about our situation."

She put an appropriately penitent look on her face. "Because being stranded hundreds of miles in the middle of nowhere with nothing but ice and snow and the occasional Care Bear is really a spectacular adventure."

"You'd better believe it," he agreed earnestly. "Next year, it'll be all the rage with today's youth."

"The big question is: will it be the rage with today's youth in Bizarro World, or with today's youth in _our_ world?" she asked, biting back a smile.

He gave her a playful poke in the shoulder. "Casey, Casey, Casey, why can't it be both?"

"Well, for one, Edwin would die of cable-deprivation within the first twenty-four hours," she pointed out.

"And can you imagine Ralphie meeting the weird Keeper Guy?" Derek asked.

She thought about it and promptly burst into laughter. "I don't know who I'd feel more sorry for," she choked out between giggles.

"Ten bucks says Ralph would accidentally tip the outhouse over in the first day," he said.

That set them both off, and pretty soon, they were leaning on each other to keep from falling down.

"And here I was, thinking today was going to be crappy," she told him once she'd regained her breath.

"Well, it's like I've said before, Case -- I always knew you had a sense of humor buried somewhere wa-ay deep down," he said, still chuckling.

"De-rek!" she cried, elbowing him in the ribs.

In reply, he just tweaked her nose and took off running before she had a chance to take another swipe at him.

* * *

"It's coming down pretty hard..."

"Thank you, Captain Obvious," Casey said sarcastically, glaring over at him.

He folded his arms defensively over his chest. "What? I'm just saying."

The clouds had only gotten darker as they walked. There were flurries in the air when they took their first rest break, but by their second, it was snowing so hard they could barely see. It was getting harder to walk, too, since the snow on the ground was already significantly deeper.

"We can't stop," she said, wrestling the lighter of the two bags away from him and putting it over her shoulder as best as she could manage. "We have to keep going."

Scowling, he yanked the bag back. "_Why_?"

"We -- what?" she asked, taken off-guard.

"Why do we have to keep going?" Derek asked, over-enunciating his words in a way that made her want to slap him.

That might qualify as the dumbest thing she'd heard all day, and only an hour ago, they were debating whether the Karate Kid could take that blond kid from the Chuck Norris karate movie Derek forced her to watch on TV the week before they got dragged on vacation.

Derek had argued that the blond kid broke, like, thirteen bricks at once and the Karate Kid was kind of lame without Mr. Miyagi to back him up. But Casey thought she refuted him pretty well. The blond kid was asthmatic and hadn't actually thrown a punch at any point during the movie that she could remember. Plus, wasn't the Karate Kid's crane technique thing undefeatable or something?

Anyway, the point was: Derek was being an idiot, and she was going to call him on it.

"So you've changed your mind about wanting to go home, then?" Casey asked snottily. "Or have I gone suddenly blind and just not noticed that we're there already? Did we _used_ to live in Siberia? I guess I just can't remember back that far, Derek."

Rolling his eyes, he riffled through a bag for a shirt and slipped it over the one he was already wearing. He pulled out another one and threw it at her. "Put this on, doofus. Your lips are turning blue."

If she hadn't been so cold, she would have ignored him, but... "This shirt smells horrible," she complained as she pulled it over her head.

"Oh, well, let me just pop it into the washing machine I see right over there. Or maybe you know a magical cleaning spell-thingy or something. You been holding out on me, princess?" he asked snidely.

"You are _so_ proving my point for me," she said, breathing shallowly as the shirt's stench filled her nostrils. The added warmth almost made it bearable, but the suspicion that she likely smelled just as bad as the shirt canceled it out. "The faster we get home, the less time we have to spend freezing our collective asses off."

"I've always wondered about that expression," he said, looking thoughtful as he offered her a handful of dried fruit. "I mean, is that even _possible_? Like, you're getting colder and colder, and then suddenly, whammo! There's your ass, right there on the ground. That doesn't make any sense."

"Derek," she sighed, taking a few pieces of fruit. "Quit stalling; we need to get a move on."

In an obvious show of defiance, he just scooped up some snow, formed a snowball, and started licking it with a disconsolate air. "Another expression I've never really understood. And have you noticed that even though snow and water are, like, made of the same stuff, after you eat snow, you're just as thirsty as you were before?"

"We have to stay hydrated, even if there's no liquid water to--"

Damn it. She was letting him distract her again.

Clearing her throat, she glared at him, refusing to speak.

He finally stopped what he was doing and looked up at her dispassionately. "Okay, so here's what I'm thinking. If we keep walking into the middle of a fucking blizzard, all that's going to happen is that we're going to die of exposure before we find the stupid island. But if we hole up somewhere and wait it out, we've got a better chance of survival."

She waved a hand at the flat expanse of snow surrounding them. "Hole up _where_, Derek?"

"Admittedly, my plan is not without its little flaws," he said smoothly, "but it gives us better odds than yours does. There's patches of trees and shit around, Case. Once we find one, we can build, like, a hut or something."

"I want to go on record saying that this is the stupidest idea ever," she said, plucking his snowball out of his hands and taking a big bite. How the hell were they going to build a shelter with no supplies or tools?

He raised an eyebrow, although she wasn't sure if it was because of what she'd just said or what she'd just done. "Duly noted. If we don't make it, I'll be sure to tell everyone we run into that you thought my plan was dumb."

She threw the half-eaten snowball at his head.

* * *

It was still daytime when they found the next stand of trees, but Casey's leg muscles were burning from having to walk through waist-deep snow for hours on end, and Derek was apparently tired enough that he'd stopped complaining hours ago. But under the cover of the trees, it was snowing a lot less. It even felt sort of warmer, too.

With a smug expression, Derek dropped their bags and started lugging thick branches into a big pile. He never actually _said_ I told you so' as he worked, but it was written all over his face.

He'd amassed a fair number of logs and used his sword to cut a length of tough vine snaking around a nearby tree. But it wouldn't knot together the way he obviously wanted it to, and the third time he dropped a log on his foot and swore, Casey couldn't help herself.

"Having some trouble, Derek?"

"Shut up," he grunted, repositioning the log and wrapping the vine around it again.

She handed him a new bit of vine when the one he was holding snapped. "I have to admit, I thought _Swiss Family Robinson_ looked pretty fun when I was a kid, too, but there are some key differences at work here."

Whatever he muttered under his breath was probably disgusting and/or insulting, but she wasn't going to let it stop her.

"First of all, they didn't build that cool house with the rope ladders and stuff overnight. And, if you want to really be honest, they didn't build it at all -- some stage crew with hammers and saws did. Also, they were in the freaking tropics and weren't worried about freezing to death," she pointed out.

He gave the log a savage kick and looked up at her. "Hey, here's an idea: you stop being a critical bitch and do something useful."

Oh, she was _so_ not willing to put up with this sort of shit right now.

"Useful?" she repeated. "Okay, Venturi, I'll be _useful_. In fact, I'll get out of your way and let you play _Robinson Crusoe_ all by yourself. If you're _really_ lucky, maybe I won't come back."

As she flounced off, she heard him swear again but told herself not to turn around.

* * *

A long time later, after she'd explored their mini-forest as thoroughly as she could and found some _very_ interesting geographical features, she stalked back over to Derek's camp and sat down next to their bags with a satisfied grin.

He still hadn't managed to even tie two logs together. A heap of torn vines was lying to one side, and he was currently trying to construct something that looked more like a teepee than anything else. As she watched, a long pole slipped free and thwacked him in the head.

She struggled to stifle a giggle and mostly failed.

"What if I've got a fatal head injury now?" he asked, scowling at her over his shoulder. "I could be dying even as we speak; won't you feel bad then?"

"Oh, terrible," she agreed. "Especially because you've wasted hours and hours playing with sticks while we could have been making out by a warm fire in a nice, enclosed space."

Another pole hit him in the shoulder as he spun around. "What did you find?" he breathed.

Folding her arms over her chest, she shook her head. "I don't know if I should say. You're really making progress here, and besides, why would you want help from a bitch like me?"

He blew out an exasperated sigh. "I'm sorry, all right? I don't think you're a bitch. In fact, you're the un-bitchiest girl I know. If there was a word for the polar opposite of bitch, that's what you'd be. Mother Teresa? Raging bitch compared to you. Not to mention--"

"Okay, fair enough," she interrupted, trying not to laugh. "And I guess, in the interest of full disclosure, I probably shouldn't have egged you on earlier by insulting your intelligence."

"Wait, am I hearing that right? Did the fair Miss McDonald just apologize for calling me stupid?" he asked with a cynical air. "And me without my tape recorder."

"Be nice or I won't show you the cave I found," she said, lips twitching.

His mouth fell open. "A cave? There's a _cave_?"

"Yep. Right over there." She pointed.

Derek was off and running before she could even stand back up. Shaking her head, she trotted in his wake.

"It's bigger on the inside than it looks from the outside," she said as she caught up with him.

He rounded on her with wide eyes. "You went _inside_? Jesus, Casey, what if one of those bear-things was in there? You could have been eaten alive!"

"There wasn't," she replied. "And it's not like I'm unarmed, you know." She tugged pointedly at her bowstring. "I can take care of myself, Derek."

"Says the girl who's been drugged, solicited by a dude fondly known as the Butcher, did accidental magic that got us thrown out of town, and got mauled by a bear," he retorted. "And that's just in the last three months."

Snorting, she flipped some stray hair over her shoulder. "Oh, like you're doing any better, Mister I Can Fight Guys And Animals Ten Times My Size and Narrowly Escape Death.' Who's the one who's gotten the most broken bones since we've been here?"

"The dislocated jaw doesn't count," he said fiercely. "That guy only punched me because _you_ shot him. The point is, you shouldn't be wandering around in dark caves full of fuck only knows what."

"It wasn't dark," she replied.

He blinked. "What?"

Gritting her teeth in concentration, she traced her hand through the air in a very careful pattern that Magic Man taught her. In response, a hovering sphere of light appeared in her hand. "Not dark," she said, voice strained as she continued to maintain the spell. "Consider it a magic flashlight."

"Hey, that's pretty cool," he said casually, argument apparently forgotten. "Why haven't you shown me that one before?"

She let the spell break, and the light fizzled away under her fingertips. "It gives me a really bad headache, for starters. Weren't you just yelling at me for being reckless?"

With a shrug, he leaned over to peek into the cave entrance. "Someone had to go in to see if it was empty, and you have a light and I don't. I guess that's not as reckless as I thought. You still could have been killed, though."

"I've lost count of the number of times one or both of us could have been killed," she said. "So, you want to keep trying to build your hut?"

He gave her a look that clearly said, Are you insane?' "I'm gonna go grab some of those logs for a fire," he said. "You mind going to get the bags?"

She was _never_ going to understand him.

* * *

"Are you _sure_?" she asked desperately for what felt like the thousandth time.

Twisting around to glare up at her, he shoved his hair out of his eyes. "I'm sick of it going all over the place, and it gets in the way whenever I try to do _anything_."

They'd been tucked into their little cave for the last five days, and the snow hadn't stopped falling since the beginning. On the second day, Casey successfully shot a Care Bear, so they even had fresh meat.

And by the third day, they'd gotten adventurous enough to attempt melting some snow over the fire to try and wash off some -- there was a bar of soap in one of the packs, and one of the blankets was sort of water-tight, so they could use it as a basin. They even managed to more or less wash most of their clothes. Now that they both smelled orders of magnitude better, it was a lot easier to share the same living space. That didn't stop the arguments, though.

And it looked like she was going to lose this one. "But I've never done this before," she said, holding her dagger gingerly, as if it was going to jump up and bite her.

"Casey, if you screw up, the only one who can see it is you," he replied. "Just... don't cut my head off or anything."

"Okay," she said dubiously, "but just remember that this was _your_ idea."

It took her a couple of tries to figure out the best way to do it, but in the end, she just grabbed random handfuls of his hair and sawed at them with her dagger. Mostly, she tried to aim for what she figured were the annoying bits -- the hair that kept flopping into his face, and the hair flowing over his collar.

"Done," she said, running her hands over his scalp and praying she didn't find any bald spots.

He grinned. "Am I ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille?"

"The important thing to remember is that hair grows back," she told him.

He ran his own hands over his new haircut, frowning. After a long pause, in which Casey became sure he was going to kill her, he just shrugged. "It's out of my eyes, and that's all I wanted. You want me to do yours?"

She dumped the clippings on the fire and waved the ensuing smoke toward the open entrance. "I'm good," she said quickly. "I can just tie mine back."

"But that's no fun," he retorted. "I can't pay you as many outrageous compliments about your hair when it's up in a boring ponytail. Come on, I bet I do a mean buzz cut."

"Huh. You'd think I'd remember compliments about my hair if there had been any," she said thoughtfully, using her dagger to cut a chunk of leftover roasted Care Bear off the spit they pushed into the ground last night.

Before she could blink, his arms were around her and she'd been pushed back against the cave wall. "I find your hair a delightful chestnut cascade that only adds to your radiant beauty," he said in a raspy voice.

"Why, Derek, that was..." she began, tilting her head. "That was really creepy. No more smarmy flirting, okay?"

"Suit yourself, princess," he said, snatching the meat from her hands and stuffing it into his mouth.

"De-rek!"

Laughing, he shook his head wildly. "You want it? Come and get it!"

So she tackled him and attempted to poke a couple fingers in his mouth while he just playfully snapped at her. Finally, he finished chewing and made a big show of swallowing the meat.

"All gone. Now Casey has nothing to eat," he said in a sorrowful voice.

She threaded her fingers in his hair and tugged gently. "There's enough to feed us for a week over by the fire," she reminded him.

"So go and get some, then. I'm still hungry," he told her, giving her a little shove.

"What you're saying is that you want to be stuck on second base for the rest of your life. Is that it, Derek?"

Instantly, his arms were around her waist and his lips were against her ear. "Would Mademoiselle prefer her meat be hand-fed to her? Or served with those weird-tasting crackers, perhaps. I assure you, at this establishment, service is our top priority."

She turned her head to kiss his cheek and offered him a sly grin. "Good to know where your priorities lie."

"How do you even know what second base _is_, anyway?" he continued blandly, releasing her and standing up. "You hate sports."

"I'm never going to live down that football thing, am I?" she asked rhetorically, watching him cross the cave and pull some more meat off the spit. "Besides, you don't have to know much about baseball to get the sex analogy."

He handed her about half of what he was holding. "I always liked thinking of it as the four F's myself. Frenching, feeling, f--"

"And that's enough of _that_," she interrupted, feeling a blush spread across her cheeks despite her best efforts to the contrary.

"Your prudish tendencies are... kind of cute, in a twisted Space Case way." He bit off a chunk of meat and chewed on it noisily. "Especially since they're non-existent half of the time," he said once he'd swallowed.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

With a wide grin, he took another bite of his food. "Bullshit," he said, spraying bits of meat all over the place. "You may not like _saying_ it, but you sure as hell like _doing_ it. At least, the limited repertoire of activities we've visited recently."

"Okay, so maybe it's not stuff I like to hear," she admitted. "But..." She held up a hand in warning before he could respond. "We've already had this discussion."

"Yeah, yeah," he replied dismissively. "You have no intention of being irresponsible, and there's no such thing as Bizarro World contraception or something like that, blah blah. Jeez, you say _one_ thing about it being sort of sexy that a girl doesn't smell as horrible as she used to and it defines the whole relationship."

She almost choked on her Care Bear. "Relationship?" she squeaked.

Flapping his hand at her, he almost managed to fling his supper in her eye. "Well, what the hell do you think this is all about, then? Like we'd sit around having conversations about this kind of shit otherwise. You really think I just walk up to random girls and start talking about... stuff that makes you blush?"

Maybe she misjudged him sometimes. _Maybe_. "I feel this strange urge to apologize even though I haven't done anything wrong," she said teasingly.

"That's something called remorse, Case," he said in his best impression of her at her snobbiest. "I know someone who's as used to being right all the time as you are may be unfamiliar with the emotion, but every now and again, even the most self-righteous of self-righteous cows can--"

It was so much easier to kiss him to get him to shut up.

Besides, she'd just gone all warm and fuzzy at his mention of their relationship,' and she had every intention of putting it to good use.

* * *

"Did you ever think it would be better to just stay here?" Derek asked abruptly, two days later.

Casey, who had just allowed him to unhook her bra and was seriously considering the merits of other forms of undergarment removal, was stunned. After all, the only thought in her brain three seconds ago concerned Derek's lips and how close they were getting to her...

And then he had to go and totally distract her. Which sucked, because she was so disoriented that the best she could manage was a confused, "Wha?"

He all but propped his chin in between her exposed breasts. "We could go back to the town," he muttered with a well-timed lick.

A squeak was about the limit of her cognitive capacities at the moment.

"And maybe you could get a job working with Magic Man." A kiss.

What the hell was he talking about?

"I could get a couple goat-things and be a farmer or something. And we could live in a little hut and just... not be complicated."

Before he could keep doing stuff to her that ruined her concentration, she shoved him away. "I can't have a conversation with you when you're... doing that," she said.

He gave her bare chest a pointed stare and she blushed. "I'm totally serious," he said. "What's the big deal about staying?"

"We don't belong here, for starters," she said, resisting the urge to fold her arms over her chest protectively. "And we've already been gone for more than three months -- Mom and George are probably out of their minds with worry."

After staring at her for a long time -- to his credit, he mostly looked into her eyes -- Derek shrugged. "Just a thought. You're probably right, though."

"Anyway, raising goats? Do you have any idea how much those things probably smell?"

His lips twitched. "And no television. Or Internet. Or video games."

"Or running water."

He winced. "Yeah, you win. Home it is, even if Dad and Nora want to make stuff complicated. With, like, rules and shit."

As she pulled him back into her embrace, a thought struck her. "You know, since it's been three months, that means that when we get back, we'll go straight to school."

"And?" he asked with raised eyebrow.

She grinned. "We won't be living at home any more."

"Sometimes, I like the way your mind works, McDonald," he said, lips tickling at her neck.

* * *

They'd gotten so used to watching the snow fall outside the cave that it took several hours to notice it had stopped.

And even then, Casey still wasn't sure how to proceed. "Maybe we should wait a while longer."

"For what?" Derek countered sarcastically. "I don't think it's ever spring here, Casey."

"Yeah, but the snow'll still be so deep. That makes it hard to walk in," she pointed out.

"I'll carry you on my back, then," he snapped. "Case, we can't hang out here forever. For one thing, we don't have much more food."

He was right. She knew he was right, but they'd reached a stable little equilibrium in their cave, and the instant they went back out onto the plains, it would be gone. Who could blame her for wanting to hold on a bit longer?

But she pushed the impulse down and focused on helping Derek pack their bags as quickly as possible. They layered their clothes and grabbed their weapons. Casey tried not to think about how few arrows she had left and tried to concentrate on melting enough snow to fill both of their waterskins.

"I'm going to miss this place, in a weird way," she said wistfully, glancing over her shoulder to see the cave entrance disappearing out of view as they walked away.

"And see, not being crazy like you, I miss sleeping on a nice mattress and knowing that there's enough food for dinner."

"I just..." But there weren't words for it, and in the end, she just picked up her pace and shot him a scowl. "Come on, Derek. We don't want to lose the daylight."

* * *

"Fuck," he said loudly.

"What?" she asked, watching him spin around in place. "And you look like an idiot, by the way."

"Like you're one to judge," he said as continued to spin. "You've got a shirt wrapped around your head."

"My ears are _cold_, jackass," she snarled. "Whereas you? Are just doing a horrible Ricky Martin impression."

He stopped spinning. "Okay, first of all, no one's made a Ricky Martin joke for the last seven years at least. And second of all, we're lost."

"Duh," she said, rolling her eyes. "We've been lost since we stepped through that stupid door."

"No, I mean _really_ lost. You know how I'd been keeping track of how to get back if we needed to?"

Shit.

Shit, shit, shit. "Yeah..." she drawled, trying not to let any trepidation show.

"We went too far in that blizzard, and the days are all messed up. I couldn't find north if you had a gun to my head," he admitted. "I have no idea how to get us back to town, or how to keep going north to find the Island."

The question was, should she tell him?

Maybe the better question was, how badly would he react if she _didn't_?

This was not going to be good.

"Um... Derek..." she began in a quiet voice.

One look at her, and he just clapped his hands over his eyes. "Oh, Christ, _what_?" he moaned. "You've got that look on your face."

"What look?"

"That world's gonna end, Derek's gonna eat my face off' look. Casey, what did you _do_?"

She bit her lip. "Well... you know how we haven't found the Island of Fire yet?"

"Yeah?" he asked, peeking out from between his fingers.

"That's because it doesn't exist as a corporeal place," she said quickly, before she could rethink it.

He blinked. "So, in English?"

"It's not, like, a place you can find with a map," she explained. "It's magic."

"That's not bad enough to put that look on your face," he said flatly. "You're holding out on me, Case."

"Well, Magic Man told me before we left that the only way to find it would be to get really lost. To seriously have no idea where we are. And when we're lost, my magic will, sort of, guide us there or something. He said I didn't actually need to know how it works, just that it wouldn't if we weren't truly lost. The Island is supposed to be a waystation, is what he said, but I don't really know what that means," she explained, allowing her eyes to slide shut.

When she opened them again, he was glowering at her. "So we've been out here, eating into our stores, freezing to death for a fucking _month_ because you didn't tell me that we had to get lost? Damn it, Casey, I was keeping track! _That's_ been what's kept us from getting home?"

She flinched at the expletive. "Derek, I _couldn't_ tell you," she said in an agonized voice. "Telling you not to keep track would have meant that you were almost guaranteed to keep track. How could we get lost on _purpose_?"

"_You_ did it," he said spitefully.

"Only because Magic Man gave me a disorient spell. I started using it once we got far enough north that there was no chance of us wandering back out of the snow. And I don't have enough magic to cast it on both of us and still have enough left to summon the Island. I just... I had to make a choice," she cried.

"Yeah, well, you made the wrong one," he retorted, sitting down in the snow and crossing his legs.

"Derek, I'm--"

He held his hands up. "Save it, Casey. I'm... I can't even _look_ at you right now."

She wanted to cry, but it would probably only make him madder.

After a few moments of watching him clenching and unclenching his fingers, she took several staggering steps away. As soon as she knew she was out of earshot, she collapsed onto the snow and cried until she had no tears left.

* * *

The hands on her back were hot and soothing. "Casey," a voice said urgently.

She ignored it. There wasn't any point in answering -- the only person in this world she would have answered told her he couldn't stand the sight of her.

"Casey, you have to get up," it continued. "You're gonna go hypothermic. You're too cold."

Now that she thought about it, she _was_ kind of cold. She could feel her teeth chattering.

"Typical Casey," the voice grumbled. "You go off and create some drama queen bullshit and make it so I can't be angry at you any more."

"Derek?" she rasped.

And she was bodily pulled into someone's lap. Warm arms circled her, and her head tucked itself into a shoulder almost on instinct.

"Who the hell else have you seen wandering around out here?" Derek asked. "You been stepping out on me, princess?"

Her laugh turned into a strangled sob. "You told me to go away," she whispered.

"Actually, I told you I couldn't look at you. I closed my eyes, if you care to remember."

She pressed her nose into his warm neck. "You're going to be mad at me forever."

The shoulder under her head shrugged, and his arms tightened around her. "Nah, I'm too lazy to hold a grudge," he said nonchalantly. "I was angry, I thought about it, realized Magic Man kind of put you in a shitty position, and then saw you doing your best to cryogenically freeze yourself."

"So you're not mad at me?" she asked. It was weird -- as she got warmer, she was also getting sleepy. She could barely keep her eyes open.

"Way to listen, Case." His cheek touched her forehead. "Magic Man only told _you_ how to get to the Island, and I bet he told you I couldn't know, right?"

She nodded against his shoulder. "He said the magic wouldn't work."

"So, like I said, it's more _his_ fault than yours. And it's easier to be mad at him, because I'm not interested in getting into his pants."

Boy, Derek was putting out more body heat than usual. She felt like she was sitting in a freaking sauna.

"Does that mean you're interested in getting into _my_ pants?" she asked dryly.

"Wow, where have _you_ been for the last two weeks?" he retorted. "If I've been letting Evil Twin Casey feel me up, I'd kind of like to know. I'm pretty sure it was you, though, because I'd've noticed an Evil Twin goatee."

"You're constitutionally incapable of being serious for more than five minutes, aren't you?"

She felt his face stretch into a smile. "It's part of my charm, really. And it comes in handy when dealing with neurotic princesses."

"You're not really increasing your chances of getting into any nearby pants with _that_ attitude, young man," she said teasingly. "And you can let me go now. I'm feeling a lot warmer."

"Who says that's why I was holding on to you?" he asked, not releasing his grip.

"Derek, seriously," she said, pushing at his chest. "I'm, like, on the verge of a sweat here. Do you really want to see that?"

He let her stand up then. With a contemplative expression, he grabbed a handful of snow. "You know, it _is_ a lot warmer. But there's still just as much snow as there was before, when it was colder than a witch's tit."

"Real nice image, Derek," she sniffed.

"Think about it, Casey," he said in a chastising tone. "Hot air, cold snow... what's magical and hot?"

Her eyes widened. "The Island of Fire!"

They were going home.


	12. Where at the Top of the Tallest Tower

A/N: Hey, wow, next to last chapter! Pretty exciting stuff. Also, fair warning, but I sort of got all maudlin and flashback-y. Thanks for reading!  
Also, it just occurred to me that I totally stole the phrase 'sparkly and magical' from a review someone left for this story. Because it's just that funny and appropriate.

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Twelve: Where at the Top of the Tallest Tower

"So if it's so hot out here, where's the Island?" Casey asked.

He glanced around with raised eyebrows. "You're asking _me_? You're the one who's all sparkly and magical. Shouldn't you know?"

"Well... maybe we should just follow the heat," she said after a while. "Unless you have a better idea."

He thought about it. "Nope. But if we get burned to a crisp or something, I'm blaming you."

"I think that's a risk I'm willing to take," she said sardonically. "You got your sword?"

Unsheathing it, he waved it at her. "How about your bow, tiger?"

An arrow was halfway to her bowstring before he even finished talking.

Silently, they walked forward, feeling the heat envelop them.

Casey kicked at the ground. "Why isn't the snow melting? This doesn't make sense."

"Duh, magic island," he muttered.

"But even magic has to follow the laws of physics, right? I mean, snow melts when it gets hot, and it's got to be at least eighty degrees right now." She scowled at the snow-covered ground. "I don't like this."

He grinned humorlessly. "I've felt that way since we got here, Case. Welcome to my world."

Whatever snappy retort she was going to make never happened. They rounded a corner and everything came screeching to a halt.

They'd found the Island.

Casey's bow slid out of her hands and fell into the snow. "Oh, no," she said frantically. "I did _not_ sign up for this shit."

"Casey," he said in the most patient voice he possessed.

"Derek," she replied in a mocking parody of his tone. "There's a _fucking_ lava moat!"

Okay, he had to admit that was some pretty scary stuff. _Island of Fire_ was apparently a really literal name, because it looked like the whole damn thing was burning up.

There was a castle sitting on rock, surrounded by a terrifying lava flow. The air was thick and steamy, but the snow on the ground remained stubbornly intact. Derek was beginning to understand why that freaked Casey out like it did.

Of course, she didn't seem all that bothered by the magic no-melt snow any more. The lava had her full attention.

"Casey," he tried again, laying a hand on her arm for good measure. "That's the only way home."

She shook her head. "Derek, I saw _Lord of the Rings_ -- I know how this is gonna end. I think raising goats in a shack back in town sounds awesome. Why don't we go right now?"

As she spun on her heel, he grabbed her shoulder. "Casey, you gotta just put the drama shit away. You can flip out later, after we get through this."

"See, that's the thing. I'm not going to get through this. Do you see that bridge, Derek?" She pointed.

Now he saw what the biggest problem was.

That was probably the most rickety, broken-down bridge he'd ever seen in his entire life. Admittedly, he hadn't seen a whole lot of actual bridges, but he'd seen a lot of movies featuring bridges. Even freaking Indiana Jones probably wouldn't have set foot on this one, even if he had a whole damn _army_ of Nazis running after him.

"We... it doesn't look that bad," he heard himself say lamely.

She gave him a wide-eyed look. "Are you nuts?" she cried. "That thing looks like a death trap!"

Even if he privately agreed with her assessment, there was no way he was going to admit it out loud. "It's our only option," he said.

"No," she said, shaking her head so that her hair went flying all over the place. "We've got _lots_ of options, and they're great ones. Really. I mean, you had fun fighting for money, right? And I'm good at accidentally shooting stuff, and I bet that could be a good job skill somehow. So I think we could be really happy living here if we just--"

"Casey," he said sharply. "Stop it."

"Well..." she said in obvious desperation. "Can't we, like, flip for it or something?"

With a sigh, he dug around in his pockets for that quarter he'd been carrying around. "Sure. Heads, and we cross the bridge. Tails, and I knock you unconscious and drag you across the bridge."

"De-rek!" she shrieked.

And he was done. "Look, Casey," he said exasperatedly, "a week ago, you all but told me that if we stay over on this side of the Door, I'm gonna die a virgin. Do you really think I'm going to let that happen because _someone_ isn't willing to cross a fiery pit of death?"

"You're such a pig, I can't--"

"Yeah, yeah," he interrupted. "Real original comeback, there, Case. Now, which is it going to be: heads or tails?"

She fiddled with her bowstring with a sullen air. "I should just shoot your ass and be done with it."

"You've been threatening to do that, like, _daily_ for the last three months. So put up or shut up, princess," he said, glaring at her.

After returning his glare for a long moment, she just shrugged. "I was right."

"What?" he asked, baffled at the non-sequitur.

"I _said_ we weren't going to get home without having to do some stupid 'togetherness' stunt, and this is it. Because there's no way in hell I would even set foot on that thing if I was alone," she told him, gesturing emphatically at the bridge.

He grinned. "Heads it is, then."

"Oh, shut up," she said, poking at him with the tip of her bow. "I'm only doing this because I can't bear the thought of never taking a shower again."

"You know..." he drawled in his best effort at a sexy bedroom voice. "I wonder if maybe..."

"If you're about to say something about water conservation or washing my back, I'm _totally_ going to slap you," she said tightly.

Giving her a companionable nudge, he started walking toward the Island. "Come on, fun-killer. Home awaits."

"Or, you know, a fiery, horrific death with no chance of escape," she said glumly, trailing behind him.

* * *

On the one hand, dealing with Casey's not-so-little panic attack was annoying and nowhere near his responsibility, but on the other, it _did_ take his mind off the fact that he was going to have to cross the bridge too.

Her hand suddenly clapped over his forearm in a death-grip, nails digging deep under his skin. He thought about saying something, but her chalky expression and panicked eyes suggested she probably would either just ignore it or finally make good on her promise to shoot him with an arrow.

Although he _had_ made her put her bow back over her shoulder. Even if they ran into something on the way across, it wasn't like she'd be in control enough to do anything about it, and he couldn't get rid of the mental image of her dropping the damn thing into the lava and instinctively going after it. She shouldn't have mentioned stupid _Lord of the Rings_ -- now he couldn't think of anything else.

"No rails," she whimpered. "Nothing to hold on to."

He bit back a retort when he felt her nails go in deeper; he was going to have freaking _scars_ from this. "It'll be okay," he told her, feeling stupid.

Together, they stepped onto the first plank, and Casey let out a loud sigh when the wood failed to collapse and send them falling into the swirling lava below.

"See?" he muttered, offering her a smile. "Nothing to it. That's one down."

"Jesus, don't say _down_," she moaned.

Step by step, Derek all but dragged her across. There was a tricky moment when they came across the first broken board. Casey had started breathing really hard and her eyes slammed shut, and he'd had to talk her through stepping over the hole even though she wouldn't open her eyes for anything.

As soon as there was solid ground under their feet again, Casey fell to her knees with a cry of relief, her whole body shaking.

"You owe me for _life_," he said mildly. "You also better hope we don't have to go back that way, because I only do that sort of shit for someone once."

Her eyes were wide and moist as she looked up at him. "How the hell were you not going out of your mind?" she asked with only an edge of nastiness. "You scream at the mere suggestion of a mouse in the house."

Really, what harm was there in being honest? It wasn't like anyone would believe her even if she told them. "I kind of had other stuff to focus on," he admitted. "If you hadn't gone completely psychotic, I _might_ have been able to express my anxiety a little more freely."

Blinking, she tilted her head. "Are you saying that I helped you?"

"No," he said a bit too quickly. "I just... it's like in a hockey game, okay? I'm freaked and puking my guts out for a week beforehand, but when I get out on the ice, I've got too much other shit to do to be scared. Same deal."

"So I _helped_ you," she said again, lips twitching.

He sighed and folded his arms over his chest. "You're not going to let this go, are you?"

Scrambling to her feet, she wiped her eyes and took several deep, calming breaths. "Nope."

"You helped me, all right?" he shot back, scuffing his sneaker in the dirt. "Can we go in the scary-ass castle and figure out how to get the hell home now? I'm getting kind of worn out from all the drama and touchy-feely shit."

She pulled out her bow again and gave him an inscrutable look. "Thank you, Derek."

What the hell was she thanking him for? "Come _on_," he moaned, bouncing on his heels.

He let her lead the way; she had the bow, after all, and would be in a much better position to take out someone lurking in the distance. And he hadn't been joking about the castle, either. It did kind of freak him out, and he wasn't exactly looking forward to going in. Casey had done a good job of keeping him too distracted to worry about the bridge -- and how sucky was it that she _knew_ it, too? -- but she didn't seem too fazed about the castle.

The enormous door loomed in front of them. And it was seriously _looming_. There were some big football players at Thompson that were pretty good at the basic loom, but this door was a champion at it. If there was a World Series of Looming, this door would take it, hands down. The Mafia could take lessons from--

_You're babbling. _

He forced himself to focus on Casey's hand, reaching out to grab the door ring. Metal scraped against metal as she twisted it.

The latch lifted, and Derek tried to push his panic deep down into a place where he didn't have to feel it.

It didn't work.

* * *

When Derek was nine years old and his parents were just starting to realize that being married to each other required more effort than either of them were willing to put into it, they had gone through a brief stint of marriage counseling. Which Derek thought was incredibly lame even at the tender age of nine, but if it distracted them from the fact that he was flunking... pretty much everything, then whatever worked, right?

But part of their counseling was a weekly 'date night,' to get reacquainted with each other and remember why they fell in love in the first place. Derek knew that this was the purpose of 'date night' because Abby had shrieked it at the top of her lungs several times before George would agree to go. In hindsight, he realized that George probably went along with it just to get her to shut up.

The big problem with 'date night' was that, over the years, Derek had done a spectacular job of running off each and every babysitter that they'd ever had. Even the draw of fifty bucks an hour wasn't enough to bring a sitter into the Venturi household. But 'date night' had been mandated by their therapist, and kids weren't allowed to tag along, so they had to figure out an alternate plan.

So Derek had been put in charge of six-year-old Edwin and infant Marti and begged to _please, please, for the love of everything you hold sacred, even you hold something sacred, right, Derek_ not burn the house down or do anything that might require medical intervention. It had occurred to him even then that neither of his parents apparently thought much of him if he couldn't be trusted to not kill his little brother and baby sister. But, whatever.

'Date night' had started off as calmly as it could: Abby and George were fighting as they walked out of the house, and Derek had to lug Marti and Edwin next door to ask Mrs. Davis if they had any milk he could use for Marti's supper because they didn't have any at home. Nothing too out of the ordinary.

He fed Marti with a bottle and threatened to feed Edwin with a bottle when he spilled his bowl of canned ravioli. And later, they had their traditional 'Mom and Dad aren't here' potato chip fight and had a competition to see who could make Marti laugh the hardest with funny faces. Derek had been so distracted by being in charge that he forgot to steal the remote and make Edwin wash the supper dishes.

To really throw their parents for a loop, they'd even gone to bed on time. Derek and Edwin played 'campout' in Marti's room, partially so that Derek could hear her since the baby monitor's batteries went dead weeks ago, but mostly because he didn't think he could fall asleep knowing that his parents weren't home.

He must have fallen asleep at some point, though, because he remembered waking up to the sound of a very distant baby cry.

Jerking awake, young Derek realized three things. Number one, Marti was screaming her head off. Number two, Edwin was making these weird wheezing noises. And number three, he was feeling sort of itchy and tickly at the same time.

As he jumped up to see what was wrong with Marti, he noticed that the blankets were covered with little black spots. A _lot_ of little black spots.

And they were moving.

He didn't remember doing it, but he apparently went and switched the lights on.

Spiders. Hundreds, thousands, millions of spiders, crawling all over the room. Into and out of Marti's wailing mouth, all over poor Edwin and their camping blankets.

He could feel them in his hair, under his pajamas, even in his ears and up his nose.

But nine-year-old Derek did the best he could. He grabbed Marti and Edwin and hustled them all into the tub, washing the spiders down the drain and scrubbing until their skin was bright red. All three of them had numerous spider bites.

Edwin's breathing only got worse and worse, and in the end, Derek had to do exactly what he knew would send his parents through the roof.

He called the emergency people.

'Date night' went very blurry after that, after the ambulance got there and he was no longer in charge. He did remember throwing up a lot, though. And every spider he saw floating around in his vomit made him throw up all over again.

They called his parents from the hospital, once Edwin had been given a shot that made him start breathing better. George and Abby came rushing over from wherever they'd been, and Derek had been sure they were going to start yelling at him. After all, he'd done exactly what they'd told him not to, hadn't he?

And at first, his fears were realized. Abby marched into the ER, jerked him off the cot he was sitting on in between his bouts of nausea, and asked him what the hell he had done to his brother and sister.

But before he could answer, the big EMT who had carried him over his shoulder into the ambulance and calmed him down from panic attack that started right about when they pulled up to the hospital stepped in. He told her that it looked like the spiders got in through a hole in Marti's ceiling and maybe they ought to check their attic for wood rot instead of screaming in public at a nine-year-old who'd probably just saved his brother's life.

Abby had turned really red at that, and Derek spent the next six months telling everyone he met he was going to be an EMT when he grew up.

But everything turned out more or less okay. Marti seemed uninjured and just as happy as she usually was. And now they knew about Edwin's allergy to spider bites, and he carried around one of those kit-things. And Abby basically moved out of the house the next day without so much as an 'I'm sorry' to Derek, while George called a contractor to fix their roof, apologized to all three kids pretty much every hour on the hour, and took them grocery shopping for the first time in weeks. By the tenth time he told them things were going to be better now that the fighting had stopped, Derek actually believed him.

Derek had gotten three things out of the ordeal: the two-wheeler he'd been begging for, bike-riding lessons that resulted in a broken wrist (George's, not Derek's), and a lifelong terror of spiders.

* * *

The door creaked open, and Casey grinned at him. "Creepy, huh."

"Yeah," he said, trying to keep his voice even and not-at-all-worried sounding. "You can hold my hand if it gets _too_ scary for ya, Case."

"I'll keep that in mind," she retorted loftily, stepping through the door without a second's hesitation.

There was no real way around it-- he was going to hesitate. The trick was to make sure she didn't notice it. "How come the bridge wigged you out, but you're all happy and excited to go charging into the freaky, sinister castle?"

"Oh, I don't know... maybe the ten tons of molten lava had something to do with it," she said in a sarcastic tone. "You can't kill it, and you can't run away from it unless you get a really awesome head start. But this isn't any worse than any of the other bizarre shit we've had to deal with."

He forced himself to take a step inside. "Not a bad point," he said through grit teeth.

And then something rustled.

"Did you hear that?' he whispered.

"My sleeve got hung up on a bit of wall," she said. "Quit being a baby."

Okay, so that did it. Straightening, he stalked through the doorway and made his way over to her. "I am _not_," he said sullenly in her ear.

"I plead the fifth." Light from a nearby crack in the wall illuminated her face as she turned around, and he could see that the corners of her mouth were twitching.

He rolled his eyes. "We're _Canadian_," he said exasperatedly. "You've got to cut out the crime show marathons, Casey, or people are going to start thinking you're dumber than you actually are."

"Maybe I've just been planning your murder and doing research on how to keep from getting caught," she shot back.

"Nuh-uh," he said, shaking his head. "There's no way you'd kill the guy offering to make out with you on a daily basis."

She opened her mouth to reply, but there was a louder rustling noise, and she shut it again with a confused expression.

"Jeez, Klutzilla much?" Derek exclaimed. "Tuck your shirt in or something and stay away from the walls."

"Derek," she whispered, "I haven't moved. Have you?"

Somehow, he'd forgotten they were standing in the middle of one of the scariest places he'd ever been, but the rustle turned into a weird scratching sound, and the panic came crashing back down.

"What _is_ that noise?" she asked no one in particular, holding her hand out and summoning her little light ball.

As she lifted it high in the air and light flooded the dim room, Derek's stomach clenched and his mouth went totally dry.

A spider as big as a Mack truck paused in mid-scuttle and made a hissing noise. Derek's terrified eyes followed a drop of venom that formed on one of its fangs and splashed on the floor.

"Oh, _shit_," Casey muttered, fumbling an arrow out of her quiver and banishing her light ball in a single motion.

He couldn't help it. He really couldn't.

He was nine years old again and he could feel them crawling around in his _mouth_.

The sword fell out of his hands and clattered to the floor.

"_Derek_," she breathed, half-turning to take in his pale and frozen expression.

The spider hissed again, scuttling closer, and Casey turned away, focusing all of her attention on the monster.

The first arrow missed completely, and the second one bounced off a leg-- if anything, the spider started moving faster.

Another one took out one of its eyes, and it made a horrible sort of screaming noise, but still kept coming.

It took everything he had not to clap his hands over his eyes and scream in terror, like one of those stupid girls in those horror movies he and Edwin thought were so funny.

Fourth, fifth, sixth arrows, and Casey was swearing because the spider didn't seem fazed. "Derek!" she shouted.

He blinked, feeling like he was trying to move underwater.

"I'm out of arrows!" she cried. "I need your _help_, Derek!"

Stooping to pick up his sword, his trembling hands couldn't manage to grip it. "I... I can't... I just..." he stammered.

They were in his nose and Edwin couldn't _breathe_ and Marti was screaming and his mom was gonna be so _mad_...

"Derek!" Casey said, tears running down her face. "Derek, _please_..."

"Oh, fuck," he whispered, forcing himself to hang onto the sword hilt even though the blade itself was waving around so wildly he almost cut himself. "Oh, _fuck_..."

Whatever it was Casey was shouting at him got blocked out as he came face-to-face with the house-sized spider.

"Just so you know," he told it, voice shaking, "I couldn't look during this part of _Lord of the Rings_, so I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing."

He lashed out blindly, which didn't seem to accomplish anything other than whacking the flat of the blade against a leg and make the spider scuttle even more frantically.

"The belly," Casey shrieked. "Hit its weak spot!"

"No," he moaned. In between him and the spider's belly was a furiously snapping mouth full of venom-dripping fangs.

_No way. _

Not gonna happen. He knew the best way to deal with a phobia was to confront it, but this was stupid. Confronting his phobia meant something like, holding a baby spider from the garden or some shit like that. Killing a spider the size of an elephant was _not_ the way to go about it. He had to work his way up to doing that kind of thing.

Casey screamed as the spider flipped its head around and venom splashed in Derek's face. His skin went unpleasantly numb; thank God his eyes had been closed.

Okay, so he was going to work his way up to it _quickly_.

"Mother_fucker_," he said, taking another swipe at the creature with his sword. It took out a chunk of flesh, and he used the opportunity to slide in between a couple of legs while the spider was preoccupied with flailing in pain.

_Now or never..._

"Now or never," he said, jaw clenched tight and sword tip pointed upward.

Closing his eyes again, he stabbed up and through a thick layer of skin and muscle.

He jerked his arms back and felt the muscle tear.

A hot flood of something unspeakably gross came washing over him and he hit the ground rolling before the spider could collapse.

It went deadly quiet.

And then hands on his face, wiping it off. As soon as they came away, Derek flipped onto his hands and knees and vomited. "That... that was disgusting," he said, coughing.

"I... I didn't know you didn't like spiders," Casey eventually said, surprisingly tactful for once.

"Not something I share," he said, retching again. "But if I didn't like 'em before, now they _really_ fucking piss me off."

She chuckled. "I just hope there was only one."

"Don't say shit like that," he told her seriously. "Or I won't save your life any more. And you not even saying 'thank you.'"

"I find myself unwilling to properly display my gratitude until you've changed your clothes," she admitted.

He cracked an eye open. "Are you telling me that we have clean clothes?"

She shrugged. "Clean-_ish_. Don't you remember bringing the bags over the bridge with us?"

In his haste to get back to the corner where he'd dropped everything, he slipped three times in his puddle of spider guts. "Oh, my _God_," he breathed, stripping down to his boxers and using a blanket to scrape off as much ick as he could. "I could scrub for a freaking _month_ and not feel clean."

"Come on, Superman," she teased. "The sooner we get started again, the sooner you can start scrubbing."

He was _not_ going to feel embarrassed. "You know, Casey, the more you make snide remarks about my underwear, the more I become convinced that you're fascinated by my delightful sense of child-like whimsy."

"Or child-like something," she said with an eyeroll.

Tugging on a pair of trousers and a shirt he hadn't worn for a few days, he began the slow and repulsive process of putting his spider-encrusted sneakers back on. He would have left them, but for all he knew, there would be a room down the hall full of broken glass or something equally stupid. "Says the girl wearing neon underwear," he said lightly, giving up his efforts to retie them. "At least my undergarments make an appropriately ironic fashion statement, whereas yours are just tacky."

"I can't believe I'm having this conversation with you," she said, putting her face in her hands.

"Right after an evil spider battle, even," he agreed solemnly.

She shot him an incredulous look, but after a second, she leaned over and planted a chaste kiss on his lips. "Thanks for saving my life, Superman."

He grinned. "Thanks for thanking me even though I probably taste like spiders and puke."

"De-rek!"

* * *

"Well, _I'm_ lost," he said, sitting on a nearby staircase and grinning up at her. "Got any suggestions, magic girl?"

They'd been wandering around the castle for a little while, basically opening doors at random and getting nowhere.

"I'm thinking," she replied, sounding sort of frustrated. "It just... all Magic Man told me was that to find home, we had to want to find home."

"There's no place like home," he said dryly, lifting his feet up in the air so he could click his heels together. They didn't actually _click_ so much as _squish_.

She rolled her eyes. "You're an idiot."

"Yeah, but at least I'm cute, right?"

"You might be on to something, though," she said, apparently ignoring his remark. "Fairy tale rules and everything. But, I don't... why can't I remember?"

"I know in those Disney movies Marti watches over and over, they always have to run like hell all over the place and up stairs all the time," he offered. "Of course, in those a fire-breathing dragon is usually after them, and I really don't want to have to deal with--"

"That's it!" she interrupted. "Derek, you're a genius."

He blinked. "While truer words were never spoken," he said, bemused, "I don't recall that I've ever heard you say them before."

With a light punch in the shoulder, she started pulling him to his feet. "Come on, Derek. I know which way to go now."

* * *

"Are you sure? 'Cause it looks like all the other doors in this damn place," he said, giving both her and the door a skeptical look.

Sighing, she just put her hands on her hips. "It has to be," she replied. "It's the smallest room at the top of the tallest tower. That's, like, fairy tale _law_."

"So, basically the hardest and stupidest thing we could be forced to do is what we're going to have to do?"

She grinned. "You're finally catching on."

"Well, ladies first," he said, stepping back from the door and waving his hand.

"How about only person with a weapon first?" she retorted. "We don't know what's on the other side."

With zero hesitation, he pushed the sword into her hands. "Sure. Fine by me."

"You suck, Derek," she grumbled, hefting the sword and giving it an experimental swing. She grunted a little bit, and some of her hair escaped its ponytail to flop into her face. A bead of sweat started to make its way down her neck, and it occurred to him in that moment that he'd never seen anything sexier in his entire life.

"Jeez," he said before he could help himself, "chicks with swords are kind of _hot_."

The sword aimed itself clumsily at his throat. "They're also kind of deadly," she said pointedly. "So unless _you_ want to go first..."

"I'll ignore your obvious sexual charisma and let you get on with it," he completed in a rush.

"Sexual charisma?" she echoed with disbelief.

He grinned and shook his head. "Hey, I can't be suave and charming every second of every day, can I?"

"You _are_ making a pretty decent case for being delusional, though," she said, nudging the door open with her foot.

Holding his breath, Derek followed Casey through the doorway.

* * *

"Oh, Jesus tap-dancing _Christ_," Derek cried. "You have got to be kidding me!"

They were standing in Marti's garden, right in front of the Door they'd come through in the first place.

"Derek," Casey said softly, letting her sword arm go slack. "Maybe it's not..."

"Of course it is, Casey," he said in a furious voice. "It's just this universe trying to fuck us over again. Well, you know what? _Fuck you_!" he screamed, looking up at the sky. "I did _not_ go through all of that bullshit to just have to do it again, so you, Universe, can just cram it in your--"

A disdainful and weirdly familiar voice interrupted his ranting. "You are, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the most crass, unintelligent boy I have ever had the displeasure of knowing."

Casey's wide eyes met his. "Is that..." she whispered.

"And you, girl, are not much better," the Keeper said, strolling into their line of sight. "Although I see that you have managed to gain a measure of control over yourself."

"I, uh, yeah," she stammered, eyes widening even further. "Wait, how did you know about that?"

The Keeper sighed, sending a wash of foul-smelling breath toward them. "Just because I'm not a mage doesn't mean I'm blind, child. Now, I believe you both have something that belongs to me."

"What?" Derek asked, sort of confused but mostly still pissed beyond reason. "You threw us out without so much as a 'screw you.' All you gave us were those stupid..."

He cleared his throat. "Yes. And they're not yours."

Casey threw the sword at his feet and started fumbling for her bow. "You can keep them, you horrible old man," she said with a scowl. "They've brought nothing but trouble."

"Imagine the trouble you would have had without them," he said, giving her a grin that revealed a whole row of rotting, broken teeth. "The dagger, too, young lady."

As soon as he had the weapons back, he thrust a pile of rags at them. "What's that?" Derek asked curiously.

"Put them on," he said. "You cannot take anything from our world to yours, including clothing."

"But... but we threw those away," Casey said with obvious confusion. "We left them at the inn."

The Keeper cocked an eyebrow. "Did you? I can't imagine how they wound up here, then."

They swapped out clothes as quickly as possible. "Oh, God, they're just as rank as they were when we got rid of them," Derek moaned. "Worse, maybe."

"Yours have blood all over them," Casey pointed out unnecessarily.

"Yeah, well, yours smell like rotten fish," he snarled.

The Keeper rolled his eyes. "Are you two _quite_ finished?"

"Let's see... you've taken away all of our possessions and made us put on our old disgusting clothes. I guess we're about as humiliated as we can be," Derek said, hands folded across his chest. "What, do we have to do it all over now? Was there something we didn't do right; Casey not get hurt often enough or something?"

With a loud sigh, the Keeper just waved his hand at the Door. "I'm trying to send you home, foolish boy!"

"Newsflash, weird old dude, we've already _tried_ that door," he said, voice tight with frustration. "It doesn't work."

Tilting her head to one side, Casey looked back and forth between him and the Door. "Derek, maybe..." She put a hand to the wood and gasped when it swung open at her touch.

His mouth fell open. "But that doesn't even make sense! You said the Door could only be opened with lots of concentration and magical training. Casey can't even make a bottle float more than, like, five feet."

"Thanks, jackass," Casey shot over her shoulder.

"This is the Island of Fire," the Keeper told him. "The two of you have met the necessary requirements for safe passage."

"No, it isn't!" he practically howled. "It's the same damn Door -- it's even got the same weird flowers growing around it. And how did we go from being inside to outside, anyway?"

Casey put a hand on his arm, but he waved it away.

"I mean, we were like five stories off the ground, in the middle of a bunch of lava and snow. We opened a door, and now we're back in sunny, warm Fairyland. You people are all fucking nutjobs!" he shouted. "I am sick and tired of being jerked around like..."

He might have continued yelling at the Keeper, but after a fair amount of eyerolling, Casey just gave him a hard shove and pushed him right through the Doorway.

Before his field of view went totally dark, he could have sworn he saw the Keeper smile and give him a cheery little wave.

_Bastard. _

* * *


	13. Was a Stinking Metaphor the Whole Time

A/N: Okay, so this is the end! I hope folks are as happy to read it as I was to write it. Thanks for sticking with me to the end. And there are references to _Labyrinth,_ Jane Austen, and Shakespeare sprinkled somewhere in here, so I can't lay claim to those gems of witticism :)

Summary: Nora said their summer trip to the country was going to be an adventure. She didn't mean it quite so literally, but when have Casey and Derek ever been any good at doing what they're told?

Rating: T for content, but M for language, so I'm hedging my bets

Disclaimer: I own nothing you see here. Big shock, I know.

* * *

What We Did On Our Summer Vacation  
by: Hayseed

Chapter Thirteen: Was a Stinking Metaphor the Whole Time

She hit the ground hard, whacking her head on a rock or something so badly she saw stars. Fortunately, when she checked the bump, her fingers came away clean of blood. That didn't stop her from letting out a little moan of pain, though.

"Serves you right," Derek said nastily from his position face-down in the grass. "Give a guy some warning next time, Case."

"You were just going to yell at him until he got mad enough he wasn't going to let us back through," she said with a sigh, forcing herself to stand up and ignore the way the landscape started to spin.

"Good point," he told the ground. "So, what do you think?"

Even though she knew he couldn't see her, there was still a great deal of satisfaction in sticking her tongue out at him. "Oh, jeez, where to start..." she sighed. "First of all, you're practically the textbook definition of dumb. And don't get me started on your horrible--"

"Okay, so as fun as this little digression has been," he interrupted, scowling up at her from his sprawled position. "I was actually wondering where you thought we _are_, superfreak."

And somehow, their eyes locked together, and Casey wondered if Derek realized she was at least twice as scared as he looked.

It was an easy thing; all they had to do was look up. Just that one little thing, and the question would be answered.

But if it was the wrong answer... dear God, if they were still stuck wherever...

Derek's eyes slid lazily shut, and as soon as they opened, she read the resolve written there.

"Please, please, please," she whispered under her breath as they looked skyward at the same time.

With a whoosh of air escaping from his mouth, he let his head fall back to the ground, just as Casey dropped down to her knees.

"We're home," he said, fingers digging into the earth.

Ha. Into the _Earth_.

A weird, freestanding door, a bizarre hedge, and -- most importantly -- _one_ sun!

"Oh," she gasped, not sure if she was going to laugh or cry, but pretty sure that either reaction would be reasonable. A loud sniffle distracted her, though. "Are you crying?" she asked Derek suspiciously.

"No," he answered quickly, sitting up and scrubbing at his eyes. "I just... got dirt up my nose."

"Whatever," she replied in her happiest voice. "Derek, we're _home_!"

He grinned. "Yeah, I totally get why people kiss the ground now. The ground is officially the best friend I've ever had. If it were legal, I would totally fucking _marry_ the ground, because it's here, and not in that horrible place."

Shaking her head, she threw a stray leaf at him. "Because that's a nice, normal reaction. Do I need to leave you two alone for a little while?"

"Nah," he said loftily. "I'm pretty sure I can control my baser urges where my ten-trillion-ton ladylove is concerned. Besides, no orifices, you know? Not as much fun as you might think."

Ew.

Double ew.

"De-rek!" she cried, punching his shoulder. "That's--"

"Sick, depraved, but totally true if you think about it?" he retorted in a flip tone. "Judge away, Case. Me and my woman don't need your opinion on our love, thank you very much."

It was hard to hold a glare when you were laughing so hard you could barely breathe. She was so happy it was clearly making her stupid. Even Derek's lips were twitching with suppressed laughter.

So, really, she had no choice but to tackle him and lean close and...

"What?" Derek asked as she abruptly froze. "What is it?"

With a groan, she let her head fall forward onto his chest. "Did you just get the overwhelming image of my mother leaping out of the trees and screaming her head off at us?"

"Um... no..." he said, clearly confused.

"It just--"

"Got really awkward," he completed, understanding dawning on his face.

"Yeah," she admitted, her stomach starting to feel funny.

He tucked a hand under his head and gave her a thoughtful look. "It's different on this side of the Door," he said. "It feels more real."

"It feels more like something we'll both get in _serious_ trouble over," she muttered.

His head tilted to one side. "Casey, maybe it's just--"

Oh, _fuck_. He was going to say it, wasn't he? He was going to go and do exactly what she'd begged him not to. He was going to rip out her heart and...

"...like you said, we probably don't even live at home," he said.

_Wait, what _ Her brain drew a total blank, so she actually repeated it out loud. "Wait, what?"

"I _said_," he began, sounding endlessly amused, "that since it's been more than three months since we were gone, we don't have to worry about Nora and Dad caring because we don't even live at--"

Before he could finish his thought and make her world all better again, an eighty-pound whirlwind pounced on them both. "Smerek!" it shouted. "Casey!"

She was so startled she accidentally elbowed him in the gut, but he more than made up for it by yelling in her ear.

"Marti?" she asked in absolute astonishment, staring up at the figure blocking the sun from their view.

"Are you two fighting again?" the little girl asked suspiciously, folding her arms over her chest and giving them a disapproving look. "I'm gonna tell Nora, and then she won't let you have that apartment you wanted. She told us you have to be _nice_ to Smerek."

"Fighting?" Derek echoed.

At the same time, Casey laughed nervously. "We're not fighting, Marti," she said. "We were just..."

She scrambled frantically and came up with nothing.

Fortunately, Derek was a hell of a lot quicker on his feet than she usually gave him credit for. "Didn't you see us fall, Smarti?" he broke in. "That stupid door opened up under us, and we fell down."

The suspicion increased, if anything. "But that was, like, a really long time ago," Marti said. "You've been gone _forever_, Smerek."

"Forever, huh?' he asked, shoving Casey away and sitting up. "Like, how long is forever?"

Marti grinned. "Hours and hours. You missed supper, and everything. You're gonna be in _trouble_," she informed them happily. "Where did you go, anyway? You both smell really bad. Did you fall in the Bog of Eternal Stench?"

Okay, so Casey had no idea what that meant, but Derek seemed to, because he just snorted and rolled his eyes.

"Sure, kiddo," he said. "We met the Goblin King and he made Casey the Princess of Stench. But when I made fun of her, she beat me up and dragged me in too."

Still no clue, but whatever it was had Marti laughing her head off, which maybe meant she'd forget that they went missing for a whole afternoon and then suddenly reappeared looking like they'd fought wars.

"And you know what else, Smarti?" he asked, widening his eyes playfully and poking her in the belly. "Casey met a fairy, didn't'cha, Case?"

"It bit me," she said truthfully. "It wasn't a very nice fairy at all."

Squealing with laughter, Marti just threw her arms around them both. "You guys tell the best stories," she said. "Even if you do smell like that time Edwin didn't change his socks for two months."

"Oh, my God," Casey cried, panicked. "It's _that_ bad?"

* * *

As Marti dragged them back to the house -- which was secretly awesome, as Casey herself would never have managed to find the damn place on her own -- she kept up a running chatter the entire time. Casey learned that supper had consisted of hastily assembled sandwiches, which Casey felt no remorse about missing, Edwin and George managed to set up the video game system _and_ break a window throwing a football indoors, and Lizzie made friends with a girl from next door whose parents were also on vacation.

Said parents had apparently invited the entire McDonald-Venturi clan into town to check out the local scoop shop, but Marti had declined by telling her parents that she was playing Hide and Seek with Derek and Casey, and "getting in a car would be cheating." Apparently, the next-door family had a little boy approximately Marti's age who she thought was gross for picking his nose and rude for attempting to smear it in her hair. Which also meant that she had no intention of sitting and watching him eat and/or throw an ice cream cone because most boys, but that one in particular, were icky and useless.

"Good girl," Casey said warmly.

"Wait a sec," Derek said in a disapproving voice, "Dad just left you at the house all by yourself? You're, like, a little kid!"

She gave him a well-duh-but-I-meant-for-him-to look that struck Casey as being strangely savvy for a little girl who was best known for having a pet imaginary dragon well-behaved enough to participate in play tea parties. "You and Casey were here," she pointed out. "And I'm nine. Daddy left you alone to babysit when _you_ were nine -- Edwin told me."

"And see how well I turned out?" he muttered.

"Smerek, just because I like to play pretend and stuff doesn't mean I'm a little baby," she huffed. "I know not to play with matches or knives, and I even got the cell phone before coming outside to look for you."

Casey couldn't help but be a little impressed at Marti's speech, but Derek looked less than happy. He dropped to one knee and grabbed her shoulder. "Marti, listen to me," he said in the most serious voice Casey had ever heard him use. "I don't mean that you're a baby, but you should be allowed to, like, just be a kid and not have to worry about stuff like matches and emergency numbers. You know what I mean?"

In reply, Marti just got that mischievous little twinkle in her eyes, slapped her hand on Derek's thigh and shouted, "Tag!" at the top of her lungs.

She took off running down the hill and Derek tore after her without a second's hesitation. As Casey followed the pair, she realized that this was probably Marti's way of saying she _did_ know what Derek meant.

* * *

There were few modern inventions more spectacular than hot water. Casey now realized she'd taken such luxuries for granted in the past, but no more. She was officially a hot running water groupie. If Derek wanted to have a passionate love affair with a pile of dirt, that was A-okay by her as long as she had unlimited hot water access.

Thank God no one was home yet. Marti had just scampered into the den and turned on the television, leaving Casey and Derek to remember where their bags were -- three months was way too long, and it took her nearly twenty minutes to recall that she'd left everything in the basement -- and have a brief argument over who got what shower.

But it didn't matter, really. After clearing the dirt out of the drain until the water ran clean, Casey was in heaven. For sure.

Too soon, though, there was a rough knock on the door.

"Occupied," she called out dreamily.

"Yeah, I figured," Derek's voice said dryly. "But I wanted to give you fair warning, princess."

Oh, shit. She hadn't bothered to lock the door. "Derek, get out," she said, a ripple of fear running through her gut. "If Mom and George come home..."

"They called a few minutes ago," he said. "They're having such a great time that they wanted us to know they were going to see a movie. Also, we're very devoted to Marti to play with her all afternoon, apparently."

"Oh, yes," she agreed with a grave nod, the fear easing but not disappearing entirely. "You're the very best of brothers to keep her occupied for an entire afternoon, during which you were present the entire time."

"I still can't believe they left her _alone_, though," he said tightly. "She's too young for that kind of stuff."

She couldn't figure out anything to say that he wouldn't take offense at, so she just shut off the water and snaked her hand out from the curtain to find a towel. She took her time drying off, but when she pushed the curtain aside, he was still standing there.

"Derek, I'm not going to--"

He flapped his hands at her and she realized that they were full of gauze and tubes of that antibiotic ointment stuff. "Relax, Spacey," he said with a teasing smile. "Your virtue is safe. For the moment, anyway."

Sighing, she just tucked the towel more firmly around herself. "Great," she said. "Thanks for the stuff. You can just leave it on the counter."

He saw her sigh and raised her one exasperated expression. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but unless you've suddenly become magically double-jointed in your old age, there's no way you're cleaning and bandaging your own back. Come on, Case, lose the towel."

She glared, but it was weak. He was right and she was going to have to give in. Eventually.

"For Christ's sake, will you just quit it?" he asked, rolling his eyes. "Nothing I haven't seen before and we both know it. So just let me help you and we'll go back to pretending that I shouldn't be dragging your ass to the hospital for stitches."

"They wouldn't give me stitches anyway," she said good-naturedly, wrapping her hair up in the towel and pulling on a pair of panties. "It's been too long since I got cut up."

Oh, _damn_. Clean underwear. For the first time in three months. She almost moaned in ecstasy.

As she turned away from him, she felt warm hands on her back. "Some of these are bleeding again," he said quietly.

"Figures," she sighed. "Maybe if I can get away with laying around and doing nothing for the next few weeks, they'll be all healed up before we go to school."

He chuckled and started smearing the ointment on her skin. It was cold, and it was all she could do not to flinch at the sensation. "Yeah," he said, "so much for not having to live at home any more. At least, for two more months."

"We're not..." Words failed her for a moment as she realized that Derek was basically giving her a back massage as she stood topless in the bathroom, but her resolve kicked back in after a while. "We can't, can we?"

A loud ripping sound as he tore a length of surgical tape off the roll. "It would be a bad idea, wouldn't it?"

"Well... we're not walking hormones or anything," she said, biting her lip as his fingers smoothed over her skin. "We have self-control, don't we?"

His lips moved against her ear and she felt her knees buckle at the sensation. "Sure you can keep away from my hot sexy man-bod, Case?"

"If you keep calling it your _man-bod_, then I think we're pretty safe," she said with a dry chuckle.

As he finished up with the bandages, he slid his arms around her waist and pressed a kiss to the back of her neck. "Well, if you can restrain yourself from my man-bod, then I guess I could attempt to stay away from your chickie-bod."

"Oh, was ever a woman so wooed?" she asked sarcastically. "I can't believe I went three whole months without killing you. Mom doesn't just owe me an apartment, she owes me a rent-free, fully furnished condo complete with a pet kitten named Mittens."

He smiled and kissed her neck again. "I believe Marti said the stipulation was that you were _nice_ to me, and I don't recall three months of niceness."

Her eyebrows shot up even as she shivered under his touch. "Hey, I'm pretty damn nice to you."

"I fail to see how threatening to shoot me at least twice a week constitutes being nice," he said, absently toying with the elastic on her underwear.

"Well, I didn't actually shoot you, did I?" she pointed out. "See? _Nice_."

"And by the way, you are so not allowed to give your imaginary kitten a dorky name like Mittens. A name defines a pet, and a name like Mittens is just cruel and unusual. You're basically condemning your imaginary cat to imaginary outcast-hood. None of the other imaginary cats want to be imaginary friends with someone named _Mittens_," he said snottily, hands sliding up to tickle the skin just under her breasts.

"Oh," she managed to gasp. "And what should I name my imaginary cat, then?"

There was a short pause and a kiss to her earlobe. "Killer Dimitri," he said with certainty. "It's got badassery and mystique all wrapped up in one awesomely cool name. If you're going to have an imaginary kitten, it _has_ to be named Killer Dimitri."

"Badassery is so not an actual word," she said, trying and failing to ignore the pleasant tingle of his breath on her neck. "And by the way, if you're trying to keep your hands off my chickie-bod, I gotta say that you pretty much suck at it, D."

"Guess I don't have as much self-control as I thought," he said, all false apologies. "Whatever will we do, Casey?"

She rolled her eyes and tugged her shirt over her head, careful to avoid the gauze -- no bra for her tonight. "Well, I'm sure we'll think of something," she grumbled teasingly.

The second she pulled the towel off her head, Derek's hands were in her hair and his lips were on hers. Her own hands found convenient belt loops on his jeans, and she gave them a little tug, pulling him flush against her. They were really beginning to get pretty comfy against the bathroom wall there when...

"_Smerek_?"

They broke apart, blinking. "Um, hey, Marti," Derek said weakly. "Sup, mi hermana?"

"What were you doing to Casey?" she asked incredulously.

Okay, Marti was only nine. So maybe that meant she didn't quite...

"I was checking her for ticks," Derek said as Casey attempted and failed to collect her thoughts.

"Ticks?" Marti echoed doubtfully.

"Ticks," he confirmed in a firm voice. "We were out in the woods for a really long time, and I thought I saw a tick on her shoulder. It would suck if she got bitten by a tick, right?"

She wrinkled her nose. "Well, yeah..."

"So it was really important that I check it out and make sure she doesn't have any ticks," he said. Casey was pretty sure she was the only one who could see the desperation in his eyes.

After a long pause, Marti shrugged. "I guess so. Boy, I hope I never get ticks."

Oh, she couldn't resist _that_. "There's always someone around to help out, Marti," she said with a wry grin in Derek's direction. "Most boys are pretty good at finding ticks."

It was totally worth baffling a nine-year-old to see the horror blossom on Derek's face. "Marti," he said sternly, "you don't ever allow a boy to check you for ticks, you understand me?"

"But, Smerek, you just said--"

He frowned at her. "I don't care what I just said. No ticks, _ever_."

Still obviously puzzled, she just shrugged again. "Okay, Derek, but I don't see what the big deal is. I just wanted to see if you would play Smash Brothers with me."

"Go set it up," he said, smiling at her. Marti visibly relaxed as she ran down the hallway. But as soon as she was out of sight, he tapped Casey's nose and scowled. "You? Are evil."

"Ticks, Derek?" she asked, folding her arms over her chest and stifling a snort of laughter. "_Really_?"

"So you decide to retaliate by giving me a heart attack by suggesting that one day a... _male_ will attempt carnal knowledge of my baby sister?"

Grinning up at him, she just giggled. "I only wish I'd had a camera. I'll just have to remember to keep one around for when she decides to tell you about her first boyfriend."

"He's dead," he growled. "I don't know who he is yet, but I'll hunt him down and murder him as soon as I get the name."

"What, without your sword?" she teased.

His hands went back around her waist again, and she didn't resist as he pulled her forward to rest comfortably against his hip. "Do you know, I'm sort of going to miss that stupid thing," he admitted. "It wasn't all bad over there."

"There were good moments," she agreed. "I liked being able to kick your ass just by thinking about it."

"Hey, I wonder..." he said thoughtfully, trailing his fingers through her wet hair. "The Keeper took away all of our shit, but I wonder if he really took _everything_, if you catch my drift."

"Everything?" she asked, confused. "But, Derek, he _did_--"

And it clicked.

"I don't know," she said quietly. "I didn't think about it."

"It would be pretty easy to check, wouldn't it?"

Pulling out of his loose embrace, Casey focused all of her attention on the bottle of shampoo she'd left on the ledge of the tub. _Move_, she thought fiercely at it. _Come on_, move, _you stupid bottle_. All of the concentrating techniques Magic Man taught her, all of the breathing exercises, her world slowly reduced to a single bottle of shampoo.

It toppled off the edge and hit the floor with a thud.

Derek stared at her with wide eyes. "Was that... was that you?" he eventually asked.

"I _think_ so," she said. "But it's a lot harder than it was over there. I don't think I could summon light or anything."

They continued staring at each other in silence.

"Well," he said, breaking the quiet, "maybe that's a good thing. I mean, I bet some, like, men in black would kidnap you and make you do magic tricks in a lab or something if they knew. So we should probably just forget about it, right?"

"It just... Derek, that means it was all real," she said. "Tomorrow, when we wake up, we'll still have scars, and I'll still be able to push things around without actually touching them. It was _real_."

He just shook his head. "Wild."

"Smerek!" Marti suddenly yelled from the den. "Smerek, you _promised_!"

* * *

"Casey," a voice said urgently in her left ear. "Casey, wake up."

"Derek, go away," she moaned.

"Casey..."

Wait, that wasn't Derek. That sounded more like...

"Mom!" Casey all but shouted, eyes slamming open. "Mom, you're home!"

Somehow, she and Derek had fallen asleep on the sofa, Marti's video game in their ears. What was worse was that her hand was halfway up Derek's shirt and one of his hands was wrapped firmly around her hip, not to mention the fact that she was sprawled on top of him just like, well, just like she'd been doing for the last few weeks.

"Casey, shut up," Derek said, making a weird snuffling noise. "I'm having a good dream."

"Derek," she whispered, trying to ignore her mother's impatient stare, "everyone's home. They went out for ice cream and a movie, _remember_?"

He was instantly awake and staring up and over her. "Oh, um, hi, Nora," he said lamely. "Have fun?"

"Casey, the back of your shirt has red spots on it," her mother said.

Derek's expression went dark, and she twisted her neck around to assess the damage. Looked like she'd bled through some of the gauze. "Shit," she swore without thinking.

"Cassandra Ann!" Nora exclaimed sternly.

Even through the obvious worry, Derek gave her a sly smile. "Your first name is really _Cassandra_? How could I have not known something as blackmail-worthy as that?"

She glared at him and continued to try and look at her back. "Don't even think about it, Venturi," she said off-handedly.

"Casey, you're _bleeding_!" her mother cried. "What did you two _do_ out there? Is Marti okay? And what happened to Derek's _face_?"

Absently, Derek's hand went up to touch the scar on his cheek. "Oh, yeah," he said. "That's old, Nora."

"It wasn't there at lunch time," she said pointedly.

With a sigh, Casey pushed herself up to a seated position. "You totally wouldn't believe us even if we told you, Mom."

"Try me," she said. "I can be pretty open-minded when I need to be. About _lots_ of things." She raised an eyebrow and looked meaningfully at the hand still under Derek's shirt.

Blushing, Casey snatched her hand away like it had been burnt. "Uh, Mom, it's not... that is... I can explain..."

She squeaked as Derek slid out from under her to sit up as well. "Casey and I were out in the woods, and we got lost, and sort of fell down one of those big rock pile things we saw when we were driving up here. That's how her back got all cut up -- show her, Case."

But she didn't have a chance; as soon as Derek mentioned it, Nora reached out and yanked Casey's shirt up. "Oh, _sweetheart_," she said sympathetically, completely distracted from the where and the how by the overwhelming and apparently bleeding _what_.

"It's not as bad as it looks, Mom," she said, almost meaning it.

"It looks like those rocks jumped out and _attacked_ you," her mother said, laying a gentle finger against one of the gauze-covered wounds. "My goodness, darling, don't you think you should go to the hospital?"

"Mo-om," she wailed. "I don't want to ruin our vacation. Just give it a couple of days and I'll be fine."

Derek smirked. "Very convincing, Spacey, but we just have to face facts -- you'll never _really_ be fine."

"I swear to God, Derek..." she said through gritted teeth.

"Hah, not so good at empty threats without the deadly weapons to back it up, are we?"

Nora blinked. "Deadly weapons?"

"Inside joke," Casey said quickly. "You know us kids today, Mom."

Derek shot her a disbelieving look, and her mom just frowned. "Uh-huh," she said, sounding unconvinced. "Are you two _sure_ you're okay? You both look, well, awful."

"Like that's anything out of the ordinary," Edwin said companionably as he shuffled into the room. "Hey, Derek, why does your hair look like it got caught in a weedwhacker?"

He glared over at Casey, who promptly threw her hands up in the air. "I warned you," she cried. "Didn't I warn you?"

After a minute, he just sighed. "It'll grow back."

"That's the spirit, champ," Edwin said with a broad grin, turning his attention to the television. "Marti, can I play too?"

"I've got winner," George said, bounding into the room. As soon as he saw Derek and Casey together on the couch, he grinned. "Well, if it isn't the two prodigals, returned from a rousing game of, what was it, Marti? Hide and Seek? I just figured Derek had finally driven Casey to the point of no return and she spent all afternoon trying to find a good place to hide the body."

"Sorry, Dad, no such luck," Derek replied unapologetically. "You're still gonna have to put up with me for the next couple of months."

Nora sighed and waved a hand at George. "Derek and Casey apparently had an accident out in the woods today. George, take a look at this."

At the sight of Casey's bandaged back, he sucked his breath in through his teeth. "Man, Casey," he said in a gentle voice, "looks like you took a beating out there."

She shrugged. "Couple of aspirin and some bed rest, and I'll be good as new in no time. Don't worry about me, George."

"Well, anything you need, kiddo," he said, patting her shoulder. "I officially assign Derek to be at your beck and call."

"Hey, why me?" Derek asked, sounding wounded and put-upon.

"I figure it's probably your fault in some roundabout way," George said lightly, absolutely failing to notice the frozen look of agony on Derek's face.

Leaning into him as much as she dared, Casey allowed her fingers to tickle his side. "It wasn't his fault at all," she said, causing everyone in the room -- except Derek, who was too busy studying his bare feet -- to stare at her in shock. "He saved my life," she told them all in a firm voice. "He pulled me back up from the edge."

"And he made sure she didn't get ticks, too," Marti piped up, not taking her eyes off the television screen.

"Ticks?" Nora echoed.

She nodded and hit enough buttons on her controller to make something on-screen explode. "Sure," she said. "I saw him checking her hair and neck and ears and stuff in the bathroom. I don't know how she would have gotten them in her mouth, though."

George grinned again, even wider this time, and Casey felt a blush spread across her whole face. "Ticks, huh?" he asked. "Derek, you understand that I have to ask in the interest of full disclosure: did you _really_ pick Casey's university because she's going to be there?"

He gave her a sideways look and she responded with a resigned shrug. "Nope," he said blithely. "But it's going to be a lot more interesting than it would have been otherwise, don't you think?"

"De-rek!" she said, embarrassed beyond belief.

"What?" he asked, all injured innocence. "I was talking about the non-stop pool tournaments we're going to have. I mean, I'll go easy on you and everything, because everyone knows that Venturis are veritable _gods_ of the pool table, but--"

"Oh, you are _so_ full of crap," she interrupted. "I could beat you with one hand tied behind my back. Even my imaginary pet kitten could beat you, Venturi."

Laughing, he shot up from the sofa and offered her a hand. "It's on, McDonald. Winner gets permanent imaginary kitten-naming rights."

"I'm not letting you name _my_ imaginary kitten," she argued. "But pick whatever stakes you want, because I'm beating the _pants_ off you."

They were just far enough away from Nora and George that he was able to give her a sly smirk. "Promise?" he whispered.

"Oh, grow up," she snarled.

As they descended down the stairs, still bickering, she could hear their parents talking in the den. "Did what I think happened just happen?" Nora asked, sounding amused.

"You owe me fifty bucks," George replied. "I _told_ you they would start getting along before we shipped them off to university. I didn't know they'd start... tick-hunting, but--"

"George!" Nora scolded, before Casey could pick her jaw up off the ground and march back upstairs to defend herself. A glance at Derek told her that he was pretty much thinking the same thing.

"I just have one question, though," George continued, seemingly unfazed. "Why were they talking about imaginary kittens?"

Derek waggled his eyebrows suggestively. "So, Case, you want to shoot pool or what? Your cat's honor is at stake."

"You're about to make an awful joke about a pool stick, aren't you?" she asked with a sigh.

"First of all, I'd like to point out that they're more correctly called pool _cues_. But also, I think I'm insulted a little bit," he said with a hand to his chest. "Just because I appreciate a well-placed sexual innuendo as much as the next guy, you assume that I'll take advantage of any opportunity, no matter how idiotic. For your information, I have every intention of taking our game of billiards quite seriously."

She raised her eyebrow and pulled a cue from the rack on the wall. "It's billiards now, huh?"

"It is," he agreed solemnly, pulling balls out of pockets and beginning to set up the game. "Although, if we were to decide on a... more R-rated set of stakes than kitten-naming rights, I might be open to suggestions."

"In a house with a nine-year-old and two fifteen-year-olds?" she countered. "Not to mention my mother and your father?"

He shook his head. "You're never going to give me any credit, are you?"

"Absolutely none," she said cheerfully. "But I might be convinced to make a list of our 'winnings' for later. You know, for when we're at school and stuff."

"I don't..." She could practically see when he got it. "Oh. That sounds... fun." With a cocky leer, he handed her the cue ball. "Hey, I'll even be generous and let you break first. After all, it's the only time tonight you're gonna have a chance to sink a shot."

Smirking, she started chalking her cue tip. "I am _so_ going to make you eat your words."

"Pool god, remember?" he asked, pointing at himself. "You don't stand a chance."

It turned out they were pretty evenly matched, although by the end of the week, Casey started using her... concentration skills to give her the winning edge. And the list of wagers, fairly long and astonishingly creative, was tucked away in her suitcase for safekeeping.

* * *

Two months and six weeks later, as Derek triumphantly crossed the last item off their list and locked the freshly adopted kitten out of their newly rented off-campus apartment bedroom for the whole afternoon -- they'd compromised and named the poor thing Killer Mittens, giving it a permanent identity crisis -- Casey had to admit that it was sort of a win-win situation.

Not, of course, that Derek needed to know something like that. He'd _never_ let her live it down.

* * *

**FINIS**

* * *


End file.
